Women across America who are seeking abortions are accidentally booking appointments at crisis pregnancy centers—pro-life, government-funded religious centers that don't provide abortions, but instead try to talk women out of terminating their pregnancies.
VICE News investigated the misleading practices used by crisis pregnancy centers to draw in women with unplanned pregnancies, and the misinformation that is spread to discourage them from pursuing abortions.
Virtual kidnapping in Mexico City isn't new, but social media is taking it to another level. Photo via Flickr user Design for Health
On November 27, 2007, a series of phone calls cut a congressional session in Mexico City short. The lower chamber of Congress was meeting when, at around 1 pm, a member of then-President Felipe Calderon’s party received a phone call from someone claiming to be holding his children hostage. Not long after, another member of the party received a similar phone call and heard a female voice screaming “Mama!” in the background while a man demanded a wire transfer. Several other legislators received calls of their own, with one fainting and resolving to wire the $20,000 the voice on the other end of the line requested—the same voice her colleagues would hear in the hours to follow. Eventually, the president of the lower chamber closed the session, blaming an apparently troublesome cleaning solution that had been used on the carpet in the room earlier that day.
As it turned out, the kids were not actually being held hostage, but the incident was noteworthy in Mexico only in that it targeted a group of legislators while they were doing government business. “Virtual kidnappings,” as the fake hostage-takings are known, have been commonplace in the country for more than a decade. In the 2007 case, authorities later concluded that the caller had been inside the chambers because he provided specific details about his targets’ appearances and actions. With 2014 already on track to surpass last year’s kidnapping total of 1,698, the threat of abduction remains very real for people living in Mexico. And the proliferation of social media has armed criminals with new tools that help make their claims of kidnapping credible to potential victims in a way that traditional phone calls cannot. In July, Mexico City’s Police for the Prevention of Cybercrimes issued an alert: the number of extortions via the popular messaging application WhatsApp had spiked. The agency outlined tips residents should follow to protect themselves, which included refraining from posting mobile numbers on social media networks and keeping profiles private.
To carry out a virtual kidnapping using WhatsApp, a criminal doesn’t have to work very hard. He obtains a person’s phone number—most often through an open profile on Facebook—and begins to research the target. He can then select a friend or family member and easily download photos and collect information about the places that person frequents. That information is used to persuade a target that the criminal either has the person already or can easily harm them if he doesn’t receive the requested compensation. He doesn’t have to spend time observing a target, nor wasting cell phone minutes (which remain pricey in Mexico); he only needs Internet access and a small data plan. He can send dozens of similar texts to different marks within minutes.
So as the way we communicate changes, encompassing new mediums that emerge to satisfy postmodern needs, criminals are finding ways to exploit every new avenue. In Mexico, petty thugs and sophisticated cartel organizations alike have learned to subvert these technologies to their purposes. Some claim the government has been slow to catch up, while others argue officials have capitalized on these very platforms to push their own agenda. All the while, citizens—who know they are no match for fighting the cartels—are unrelenting in one mission: to keep each other, and the world outside of Mexico, informed about what’s really going on in their country.
According to Carl Pike, assistant special agent in charge at the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Special Operations Division in Mexico, People tend to stereotype—and underestimate—the Mexican drug cartels. “They almost equate them to the old mafia movies, like for some reason they think criminal organizations don’t evolve and they’re not current,” he tells me. “It’s not that at all. Especially when you talk about the Mexican cartels, they’re just as savvy as any corporation or any government in the world in what they would use. So when the kids are using WhatsApp or whatever the latest communication is, that’s what the cartels are using, too.”
In 2010, when drug war violence became especially rampant and the Mexican press was gagged by frequent attacks and killings, citizens started turning to websites like El Blog del Narco to find out what was really happening. Anonymous witnesses of violent crimes and body dumps began relaying accounts, sometimes with photo and video evidence, to the site’s founder, who posted submissions indiscriminately. The blog soon boasted a strong following both in and out of the country.
And the cartels took notice.
They started sending graphic photos and videos, sometimes accompanied by threats. The mangled bodies they left on streets in one city could now be seen across the country, and the messages they wrote on giant banners and hung in public places—known as narcomantas—began to reach vastly larger audiences. Cartels wanted the Mexican public to see what they were capable of so rival groups would stay off their turf and citizens would think twice before supporting an insurgent. In effect, sites like Blog del Narco served as free propaganda machines for the cartels.
Frustrated residents of border states where The Zetas and the Gulf Cartel were waging a brutal turf war began turning to Twitter to fill the void of information left by the mute government and press. Hashtags became a key standard for reporting crime in those cities. Eventually, residents created a set of acronyms to denote what they saw. For example: SDR means “situacion de riesgo” or risky situation; CO means organized crime; and FA means armed forces.
Cartels also turned to social media for information, and they didn’t always like what they saw. In September 2011, horrified Nuevo Laredo residents found two corpses hanging from a pedestrian bridge with an accompanying sign that read, “This will happen to all the Internet snitches” and named El Blog del Narco and a popular forum for denouncing cartels, Frontera Al Rojo Vivo. The two bodies showed signs of torture, and the woman was disemboweled. (The founder of Blog del Narco would later tell the press that the couple had been contributors to her blog.) Two weeks later, a reporter’s tortured and dismembered body was dropped on a busy avenue in Nuevo Laredo with a mouse, keyboard, and headphones—along with a note that said she’d been killed for posting on social media.
“When [cartels] intimidate the media, they’re not intimidating the media to stop reporting on their actions; they’re trying to coerce the media to report on the action that they want them to report on,” says Tristan Reed, a Mexico security analyst at the Austin-based global intelligence firm Stratfor. “It’s not about downplaying the violence in Mexico. It never was—otherwise they wouldn’t be posting execution videos to YouTube or dumping 35 bodies on a major highway. It’s about controlling the information.”
Cartel members took matters into their own hands and started going online to broadcast messages. They began posting videos of torture and executions on YouTube. These are engineered mostly to intimidate, but their media campaign also includes examples of the “good” the cartels do and the perks that come with thug life.
The Gulf Cartel has circulated a series of videos of its members distributing consumer goods in impoverished areas under its control. In one video, members give out cakes to small children. In another, they provide free dinners for a community and in a third, they are seen offering relief to victims of the tropical storms that hit Mexico last fall.
On Facebook and Twitter, organized crime members regularly post photos of their gold-plated weapons, expensive cars, exotic cats and lavish lifestyles. This usage of social media for propaganda might be one reason behind the decline of narcomantas in Mexico. An investigation by Mexican newspaper El Universal found that while an average of 1.7 narcomantas appeared daily from 2006 to 2012, only one was reported every five days from 2012 to 2014. That could mean that the cartels' social media fear campaign is having an impact.
New mediums have also lent members of organized crime in Mexico novel ways to keep in touch with one another. Diversifying their communication is essential so that if one channel is intercepted by law enforcement, business can continue. They use email, Nextel radios, burner phones, social media and messaging apps. The DEA recently found that a southern California distribution group that was moving ecstasy was regularly using Xbox consoles to communicate.
“Who would have thought that you could get on the Xbox, put on whatever game and then get into that game room and you can be sitting in Miami, Florida and have a conversation with somebody in Bogota, [Colombia]?” the DEA’s Carl Pike asks. “That was one of the most eye-opening moments.”
The DEA is currently investigating how criminals are using Snapchat, which offers obvious benefits to organized crime members who might want to share important but damning information—or send a quick threat that a victim won’t be able to show authorities before it disappears. And according to the Mexico City cyber cops who issued the WhatsApp alert, at least some of those contacted do actually pay up.
“For it to be a successful scam, the culprits have to put on a theater; they have to intimidate their target,” Reed says. “The more information they know, the more realistic their threat is going to appear to the target.” When someone posts on Facebook that he is traveling, for example, that person becomes an easy mark. “If we can keep him isolated we can call his family, who knows he’s traveling to Cancun, and say he’s been kidnapped.”
This method of targeting both the victim and the family—instead of merely threatening a family without ever interacting with the supposedly kidnapped person—has become increasingly common. In December 2013, extortionists forced a Guatemalan woman in Playa del Carmen to travel to Cancun, where three other virtual kidnapping victims were already waiting in two hotel rooms under threats. The culprits, who according to media reports were calling from a Tamaulipas prison, forced the woman to do their work by proxy and collect more information about the other victims. Earlier that month, criminals virtually kidnapped an American man who was in Cozumel for an Ironman competition.
“Social media has really helped out virtual kidnappings—it’s provided a wealth of information that extortionists need,” Reed says. “Research on your target is critical for an extortionist or kidnapper and platforms like Facebook or Twitter feeds have placed all the information they need in one place.”
Many virtual kidnappings are executed by men and women sitting in Mexican prisons, while others are carried out by low-level criminals on the streets. But that money is eventually filtered up to the cartels, Reed says, because the extortionists usually belong to a gang that has ties to broader criminal organizations.
“Drug trafficking is still the bread and butter for organized crime in Mexico, but the collection of other activities makes up a substantial portion of the profits,” he says. “Things like extortion and kidnapping are critical for cartels to continue to operate.”
Social media’s emergence has helped criminal organizations enforce their rule, but it can also provide authorities with valuable information. When top Sinaloa cartel leader “El Mayo” Zambada’s son, Serafin, was arrested late last year, media outlets reported that the younger Zambada had regularly posted details of his lavish lifestyle on Twitter that helped authorities track him down. Similarly, Jose Rodrigo Arechiga-Gamboa, who was part of the enforcement unit of the same cartel and is known as “Chino Antrax,” was located at least in part because of his frequent activity online.
Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera, a professor at the University of Texas-Brownsville who studies organized crime violence in Mexico, says Mexican government agencies do use social media to their advantage, but not necessarily to track criminals down.
“The state’s agenda is not necessarily clean and good and white—it should be, but it isn’t,” she says. “Much of the time there’s misinformation or conflicting messages and there are agendas that are meant to divert attention from things and to manipulate public opinion. That becomes very apparent when you curate the information on certain platforms.”
In an upcoming study, Correa-Cabrera and her colleagues will argue that after years of tracking social media sites like Valor por Tamaulipas, they’ve found elements that suggest the participation of the state to justify public action, specifically the legitimization of the federal government’s national security strategy, which involves the militarization of the country. Correa-Cabrera and @MrCruzStar, one of the best-known citizen reporters in Tamaulipas, believe that many of the users who post to the site have connections to the Mexican army and want to perpetuate the cartel threat in the state to justify an escalated military presence.
Correa-Cabrera has been closely following the rise of citizen reporting in the border state of Tamaulipas, where hashtags like #Reynosafollow (referring to the city of Reynosa) have been successful in creating a place that citizens can turn to for reliable, real-time information on violence and crime. She says across all platforms, citizens pioneered the usage of social media to inform each other about the situation in Mexico, and the narcos and government followed. The latter two have vastly greater resources and can therefore push their messages more successfully than citizens, however.
Undeterred, Mexicans continue to take to social media platforms to inform each other—and not just about violence. With attention refocused on President Enrique Peña Nieto’s energy, telecommunications, and education reforms, the administration has enforced a policy of silence on crime and violence. Mexican authorities are becoming increasingly blatant in their attempts to control the information that makes it out to the public, making alternative outlets more important than ever.
When Sinaloa’s state government passed a law in August that would have effectively prohibited journalists from reporting on crime, the backlash on social media was at least partly responsible for the law’s repeal. And when the Mexican Congress considered a telecommunications reform package earlier this year, a social media campaign that went viral encouraged the Senate to remove or amend some of the more problematic provisions from the legislation.
The original law would have struck a serious blow to net neutrality and allowed authorities to block cell phone reception for individuals and for entire areas, like, for example, the site of a protest. The current law, which was signed in July, requires cell phone providers to keep all records on users’ activities for two years, and allows any law enforcement agency to access that data without a court order. In a country with rampant corruption, particularly among local police, citizens are worried about being watched and retaliated against for their comments, or for denouncing abuse by authorities.
“The anonymity lent by social media continues to be a great shield against censorship,” Correa-Cabrera says. “Recently the Mexican government has had a greater capacity to censor the media—the newspapers, for example are toeing an editorial line that is very different from that during the previous administration; the criticism is very limited. So social media is still an important platform for citizens to express how they feel and not only to report violence, but to provide analysis and to express public opinion in a much more honest and free way in these moments in the country.”
Follow Priscila Mosqueda on Twitter.
Johnny Lynch, The Pictish Trail
Nationalist politics and indie music have always had a lot in common. A susceptibility to utopian populism, an inflated vision of one’s own importance and sense of personal victimhood, and the belief that struggling to make rent gives one a grasp of macro-economic theory. These are all hallmarks of both the skinny mop-haired kid dancing badly at a gig and the beer-bellied asshole shouting at Asians outside a mosque.
The final great similarity between nationalism and indie music is the way talking about each of them can sometimes turn normally decent, openhearted people into raging ideologues. Reading the comments (from both sides) of many articles on Scottish independence often resembles nothing so much as listening to two indie geeks yell at each other about which one has the more obscure Jesus and Mary Chain bootleg. That kind of discourse has gotten people laid exactly never, and the sooner it’s left behind the better.
Scotland as a nation has always punched well above its weight when it comes to quality guitar music. That a country with a population about the size of Brooklyn and Queens has produced luminaries from Arab Strap to Belle & Sebastian, not to mention the Bay City Rollers, must be a testament to some sort of national genius.
Now, as Scotland faces its own national reckoning, it seemed only natural to ask the indie musician community—the key demographic in any advanced society—how they felt about the upcoming Independence Referendum.
Dave Mclean of Django Django
Django Django. Image via.
VICE: What kind of political ideals would you like to see an independent Scotland embodying—and do you think it’s realistic to expect them to be achieved?
Dave Mclean: In my mind politics should be run on the basis of care and respect. Greed is our biggest enemy. It stops things from being done properly at every level. I'm not even going to say that its socialism. It's not an ism. Its probably not even "politics" as we know it. It's a new way of thinking: a new system and a new construct. I think it's clear that the systems we have in place need to be changed in order to transcend this "greed is good, and profit at all cost" mentality.
I think that a fairer, better society can be achieved but it's going to take time. I think I can sense a sea change and it's perhaps down to people educating themselves through the internet. We no longer have to be kept in the dark by the mainstream media and fed the government line. We're more aware and its harder to pull the ol' wool.
More than any of the other artists I’m talking to, Django Django’s music is based on a strikingly eclectic range of influences—from dance and hip-hop all the way through indie and rock ‘n’ roll. Is there a tension between being so cosmopolitan in your artistic tastes, and yet supporting national separation politically?
No—in a word. My record collection spans a vast amount of styles from all over the world and they all seep into our sound. But Globalisation is the biggest threat to the cultures that gave birth to these musical movements. I don't even live in Scotland now and some people have accused me of hypocrisy for supporting independence in a country that I've left.
The thing is, I chose to live in London right now. I might choose to live in Istanbul or Berlin or Bamako in the future. But I'll only ever be from one place and that's Scotland. So why can't we run our own affairs and be the ones who attract others from Istanbul, Berlin or Bamako, or anywhere else, to come and work with us and enjoy our country and our culture?
I want us to be partners with other nations, not trying to control them through banks or bombing. National pride and national culture should be something you are proud of, not guilty of.
How do you think a independence for Scotland would affect its artistic community?
I've been asked this before and I'm really not sure that it will actually. I think that if you are a creative person you'll always find a way. I've never personally been that interested in the world of funding—"can I have ten grand to do this and that?" If you're broke, use what's at your disposal—you'll make better art. Use an old four track to record, paint on an old cardboard box.
Don't get me wrong, its important that the arts are given serious priority by the government through both funding and education. The Conservative party would probably close down every publicly funded arts space in the UK if they could. They really don't seem to understand how important the arts are for our society and that's something i think we can focus on in our new country.
Stuart Braithwaite of Mogwai
VICE: Mogwai are often regarded as a very Glasgow band—at least they are in London—how do you think independence would change Glasgow as a city?
Stuart Braithwaite: I hope that Glasgow would prosper in an independent Scotland. It's a great city but it's blighted with far too much poverty and a lack of prospects for far too many, especially considering the wealth in Scotland.
In this debate are you more drawn to questions of Scotland’s economic future, or issues of Scottish identity and "what it means to be Scottish"?
My main reasons are democracy and peace. I feel that Scotland has been badly represented for most of my life as we've had to suffer Tory governments that we didn't vote for. I also want Scotland to be a nuclear free country and want Trident moved and hopefully decommissioned after a yes vote.
How do you feel the debate around the referendum has affected Scotland as a country, and the Scots as a people?
I think it's energized the whole nation and engaged people in politics who have until now been completely disenfranchised
Mogwai is often the go-to music for filmmakers trying to create scenes of post-apocalyptic desolation. If Alex Salmond were to lead Scotland into turmoil and ruin, would it console you that it would probably be Mogwai being played over newsreels of broken-down tower blocks and burned out cars?
I'll crack the jokes!
Scott Hutchison of Frightened Rabbit
Scott Hutchinson of Frightened Rabbit
VICE: As oil supplies dwindle over the next few decades, do you see introspective-yet-euphoric indie music becoming Scotland’s greatest export? Or, more broadly, how will independence impact Scotland’s cultural relations with the rest of the world?
I think anthemic-misery-indie is already Scotland's greatest export. Scotland's strong creative identity is yet another good reason why we should be independent. To further increase that sense of pride in our own output—that would be a wonderful feeling for the country.
You guys are from Selkirk in the Scottish Borders. How do you think people there will feel if they suddenly find themselves living on an international border, having to show their passports to nip over to England?
They'll probably just go north instead. Seriously though, I don't think that a division of British people is the issue here. I love many aspects of England and will always feel like part of a bigger country in a social sense, but we have to be able to make our own decisions based on the needs of those that live in Scotland.
One of the major issues people have been arguing over is what currency an independent Scotland might use—the Better Together side claiming Scotland would not be able to retain the pound, and the Yes Campaign saying they’re bluffing—how do you see this playing out?
I think the Better Together campaign has often been one of fear and negativity, aimed at creating a sense that Scotland is currently shoving two fingers up at the rest of UK, and the currency issue is part of that. The Bank Of England has said very little on the matter and so far it has been a case of empty speculation. As far as the Euro thing goes, bars in London don't accept Scottish notes anyway, so what's the fucking difference?
Alex Salmond has promised that an independent Scotland would keep the Queen as Head of State—isn’t the point of all this to get rid of over-privileged English people, or is she alright because she’s actually German?
I haven't really thought about the auld Queen in all of this. I'm sure she's a nice old lady.
Ian Turnbull of Broken Records
Broken Records
VICE: You guys describe yourselves as undecided. What do you think are the best arguments made by each side?
Ian Turnbull: Yeah, the clock is ticking! The hardest thing about the whole referendum campaign has been the lack of completely convincing arguments from either side. To some extent both the Yes and No camps have been guilty of, at best, exaggeration and misinformation, and at worst, outright lies and scare mongering.
What do you sense the general vibe is amongst the music community in Scotland?
The music community, and the arts in general, do seem to be largely tending towards a Yes vote. I think creative people are more likely to be open to new ideas, prepared to take risks or want to affect positive social change, so it’s not really surprising.
Do you feel the debate around independence has encouraged a sense of unity amongst Scots, or have the disagreements and arguments sown more divisions?
Overall the debate seems to have been fairly civilized, but I think only time will tell how divisive it’s been. The level of engagement and expected voter turnout are massively high, so with everyone having such strong opinions on it tempers are bound to fray. Whichever way it goes about half of the country is not going to get the decision they want.
There was a very popular pro-independence member of the Scottish Parliament called Margo MacDonald who sadly died earlier this year. She was also concerned about the referendum becoming divisive, and so she urged people to recognize that you are dealing with opponents, not enemies. Not with ogres, but with fellow human beings with whom you can disagree, but must do so without malice.”
Kenny Anderson of King Creosote
VICE: You’ve just been involved in an album/film project as part of the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow called From Scotland With Love? A sense of Scottishness is obviously fairly important to you—how has that influenced your work and the way you feel about it?
Kenny Anderson: A sense of belonging is hugely important to me. I still live in the area I grew up in, as do the majority of my family and close friends, so I suppose this gives me the confidence to keep going with music. However, I do feel like I'm part of a musical community that is spread across the whole of the UK, as well as having close collaborators in Canada and the US.
My sense of Scottishness varies with the company I'm in and it has changed over the years. I'm increasingly dismayed at many of the decisions made in Scotland, and in my circle of friends we used to joke about emigrating to become "professional Scots" abroad. But that was when we still had a sense of humor, and abroad meant a journey over seawater at the very least.
A few months back you gave an interview in which you did not demonstrate absolute 100 percent commitment to the Yes campaign, resulting in quite a vicious shitstorm being directed at you on social media. How did this make you feel? Do you feel that an open and respectful debate is possible on this issue?
I felt like the referee who scored a goal in the football game between the True Blues and the Dirty Yellows, and for a short while I was booed and cheered in equal measure by both teams' supporters. Made it easier to sign for the True Blues right enough.
One of my favorite records is your "Inner Crail To Outer Space." Was this not an early call for an independent Scottish space exploration program? If the first alien contact with humanity happened in Scotland, what do you think they’d report back about the human race?
At the time it was a cry to be rescued by a kindly alien tourist, I think. I left them a cigar shaped parking space right at the door and everything. "Don't worry—these guys will only be a thorn in the side of the Galactic Federation for three centuries max."
Johnny Lynch of The Pictish Trail
VICE: Alright, so your name’s The Pictish Trail—Picts were the famously fierce inhabitants of ancient Scotland—if Scotland does go independent you’re not going to start raiding towns in the North of England again are you? And if you were, which would you burn first?
Johnny Lynch: Haha! I think we’re more likely to invade if we don’t get independence. I get the feeling that some places in the north of England might welcome a gentle invasion, though, as none of us up here are being particularly well represented by Westminster. Personally, I’d like us all to be invaded by Iceland—we could all use the health kick, and a good sauna.
You live on the Isle of Eigg. The inhabitants of Eigg recently bought the island itself as a Trust. Can you talk us through that—what do you think the experience of Eigg can teach the rest of Scotland as it approaches questions of autonomy and independence?
Eigg is the perfect microcosmic model for independence, and its story is a true testament of human resilience. You can never underestimate the strength of mankind’s survival instinct. Eigg was a neglected island that was previously owned and inherited by a number of absent landlords, who had scant regard for its inhabitants. The islanders formed a Trust, and set up a nationwide appeal to raise funds in order to “buy-out” the island—which they did in 1997.
Since that time, Eigg has become the first island of its size to go completely off-grid, setting up it’s own 24 hour power supply from renewable resources. It has a burgeoning tourist industry, and continues to attract a steady flow of new, young, aspirational families to live there—with a pioneering supportive scheme in place for those looking to build a home from scratch. It’s an island whose success is completely down to the determination of its population. I think the biggest lesson that Eigg can offer is that, even in these capitalist times, it’s possible to be a functional, and indeed successful socialist entity—it just takes bravery, a bit of self-belief and persistence.
You live on an island of 83 people (as of the 2011 census), you’re obviously a man who can deal with remoteness. But do you not worry that an independent Scotland would lose some of the international connection the UK offers?
We’re not creating borders. We’re just taking positive steps to govern ourselves. If anything, independence would give Scotland a stronger international identity. All these threats about “you can’t have the pound,” “you can’t have access to the BBC”... it’s like, um, excuse me... but we were a partnership, and those things belong to us too. They are not wholly owned by Westminster. Sometimes, though, it’s best just to walk away. Scotland will inevitably take a wee while to find its feet—but I’ve no doubt we’ll be fine after a few years.
In the event of future hostilities between England and Scotland, is Scotland not vulnerable to an English embargo on Buckfast (brewed in Devon)—would this not be devastating to Scottish cultural life?
You forget, that Scotland is home to Irn Bru—the most delicious of all the beverages—and we’ve kept the recipe a secret for generations. I reckon, if push came to shove, we’d be able to work out the Buckfast recipe. We’ve drunk enough of it!
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So, there you have it. In this completely random un-scientific survey of some random un-scientific people, independence is clearly the popular option. If you believe that being good at hitting bits of wood and metal in order to make noise gives one a deep understanding of political economy, then you should totally go out and vote Yes.
It’s certainly true that Scotland has had more than its fair share of tough breaks throughout its history, from the Battle of Culloden, to the Highland Clearances, to having its national heroes portrayed in film by alcoholic Australian bigots—but facing the choice to be governed by David Cameron or Alex Salmond is surely the cruellest joke yet.
But however the Scots choose to answer the "Should I Stay or Should I Go" question on the 18th, as long as they maintain their knack for churning out melancholy-but-catchy, literate-but-tender, epic-but-understated indie rock, the rest of us may be permitted to ask along with Belle & Sebastian, "Is it wicked not to care?"
JS Rafaeli is the Author of Live at the Brixton Academy with Simon Parkes, available on Amazon.
Destiny
Destiny is a hit, no doubt about it. The game—an always-online multiplayer shooter from Halo creators, Bungie—cost a reported $500m to make, but made that money back in just 24 hours of retail. It debuted at number one in the UK, in the process becoming the fastest-selling new video game IP of all time, replacing Watch Dogs. Its sales are roughly split 50/50 between PlayStation and Xbox platforms, proving that despite Sony’s hard sell with the software, bundling it with their PlayStation 4 console, Microsoft-owning gamers have just as eagerly snapped up copies.
And yet, it’s a not-entirely-surprising ‘failure’, too. Reviews have been mixed, what with the game offering little in the way of genuinely revolutionary elements, with leading publications awarding the game reserved scores. Eights from The Guardian and Eurogamer are good, but sixes from the likes of Gamespot and Polygon have seen Destiny’s Metacritic average, its ‘metascore’, come in at 76, from a possible 100, on PS4. The Xbox One version rates slightly higher at 79, but is based on significantly fewer reviews: just six compared to the PS4’s 55.
Stop an average man on any average street and ask them what Metacritic is and they’ll likely shrug. But to those active in the media—particularly games, music, TV or cinema—the online reviews aggregator is both a blessing and blight on their industry. It can highlight undiscovered gems from years past, which is great; but equally, it can wreck a release’s chances outright. In the crowded game market, anything that falls into Metacritic’s yellow tier—titles with a metascore of 74 and 50—is likely to be overlooked for those with a green score, 75 and over.
Prototype 2 trailer—looks alright, right?
The lines are fine, and they not only divide an apparent average experience from ones perceived to be brilliant, but can bring about an abrupt end to developers’ ambitions, and even their employment. In its October 2012 issue, Edge magazine reported on the fate of Radical Entertainment, a Vancouver-based subsidiary studio of publisher Activision (also behind Destiny, coincidentally), in the wake of a yellow-banded reception to their that-summer-released, superhero-styled Prototype 2. The game was anticipated—its predecessor was well received, the top-selling Xbox 360 game stateside in the month of its release. And Prototype 2 generally went down well—but its 360 metascore of 74, just a point off that magical green, caused problems.
Prototype 2.
Activision, disappointed with reviews and slow sales, called for an end to the Prototype series, stating that the games had “failed to find a broad commercial audience." Substantial layoffs at Radical followed, with the studio’s senior audio director Rob Bridgett going so far as to tweet that the company itself was dead.
RIP Radical Entertainment 1991-2012
— Rob Bridgett (@rbridgett) June 28, 2012
The Edge piece went on to suggest that “anything under a perfectly respectable [metascore of] 85 might as well be a failure," before highlighting a series of Radical-like situations, where publisher expectations were not met by development teams’ best efforts. Kaos Studios created Homefront in 2011, but its lukewarm reception saw THQ, itself now defunct, shut the New York-based studio down. Polygon published a fantastic piece on the Homefront saga, and its bitter conclusion for the game’s makers, in 2012, and it’s well worth a read.
Liverpool’s Bizarre Creations, behind the awesome real-world racer-with-weapons Blur and kill-streak competitive shooter The Club, was acquired by Activision in 2007 but closed just four years later, when (the green-rated!) Blur failed to turn critical praise into commercial points. Creative director Martyn Chudley was damning of the giant publisher’s role in his studio’s demise: “We weren’t making ‘our’ games anymore—we were making games to fill slots. We did believe in them, but they were more the products of committees and analysts. The culture we’d worked on for so long gradually eroded just enough so that it wasn’t ‘ours’ anymore.”
Blur—we’re not friends if you don’t think this game’s amazing?
Nobody’s about to lose their job at Bungie as Destiny continues to roll out: with expansion packs coming and a number of timed events scheduled for the next few months, the game is a kind of work in progress, making a definitive rating tough so soon after its release—hence the slow reveal of official scores. And yet its Metacritic reception could cost its makers a substantial bonus payout, as Kotaku revealed on September 16. According to archive documents dating from 2010, if the game was to reach 90 on Metacritic and/or the game-specific GameRankings site—76.21% at the time of writing – Activision would honor an agreement to pay $2.5m to its developers. Which isn’t looking likely, is it.
Bonuses based on how a game (meta)scores is nothing new. Obsidian Entertainment missed out on valuable monies from their publisher, Bethesda, when their 2010 role-playing game Fallout: New Vegas came in at 84, a single point south of activating the extra payment. Missing out on the cash resulted in necessary layoffs at the Californian studio—which was behind the surprisingly excellent South Park: The Stick Of Truth earlier in 2014—and had Ars Technica calling for an end to such a bonus system, writing: “publishers… are using [Metacritic] improperly as some sort of final, objective arbiter for the quality of games its developers are putting out.” Which, of course, is crappy in the extreme, as we’ve all played through enjoyable games that have fallen into Metacritic’s wide yellow waters.
I can name a bundle of games that Metacritic will tell you are, at best, to be picked up in the bargain bins for a spot of attention when you’ve exhausted all the big-hitters, but that I’ve fallen for fairly heavily. I was absolutely smitten with the art and atmosphere of Dontnod’s future-Paris-set adventure for Capcom, Remember Me—and I wrote about its appeal over here. Its metascore: 70. I played through the whole of The LEGO Movie Videogame with my oldest son, and we both adored its humor and simple, building block puzzling—but there it is with a metascore of 69.
Remember Me—this game is goddamn gorgeous
2012’s Binary Domain is a third-person shooter from veteran Sega designer Toshihiro Nagoshi, a man with credits on some true classics: Daytona USA, Super Monkey Ball and the celebrated Yakuza series. Like Remember Me, its (near-future Tokyo) setting is excellent and its action incessant, but a few minor shortcomings saw it saddled with a 74 on GameRankings. Sales were low, with only 20,000 copies sold in two months of US retail. Despite a great team behind the scenes, a decent publisher in Sega, and some positive reviews from key publications—8/10 from Eurogamer, 8.5 from Machinima—it’s one of those Edge “failures," falling into what the magazine’s 2012 piece termed the “dreaded mid-tier."
It’s incredibly difficult to bring a truly shitty game to gold status—the moment at which its code goes into mass manufacture and reaches store shelves (and digital shop fronts) the world over. Most likely fuck-ups are aborted long before the public gets wind of them. But some developers have, admirably, achieved amazingly abysmal results with relatively recent offerings: 2013’s Ride To Hell: Retribution, by Newcastle-Upon-Tyne studio Eutechnyx, rated at 19/100 on Metacritic (for Xbox 360—other platforms scored lower), and the same year’s DARK, from German developer Realmforge, averaged 38 for the same system. And we definitely don’t need to say any more about Aliens: Colonial Marines, DO WE?
In its time, the massively popular Wii played host to some spectacularly awful games. These ranged from terrible movie tie-ins like Ice Age 4, to the Far Cry series’ low point Vengeance, to the abject disaster that was futuristic racer Wheelspin, a game so bad that Official Nintendo Magazine—yup, the system’s official magazine—called it “one of the worst games we’ve ever played… (that) falls apart quicker than a roll of toilet paper in a car wash." Then there was Ninjabread Man, considered “unbearable” by IGN as it awarded the game 1.5/10 and the utterly bizarre Sukeban Shachou Rena, which apparently sold just 100 copies in two weeks in Japan. The player must dodge flying cats that have taken over an office, while catching friendly ones. Or something. I don’t know. Watch the video below and try to make sense of it.
Sukeban Shachou Rena—no, us neither
Makes pigeon dating look totally reasonable. But legitimately bad games are becoming fewer and further between—look at the PlayStation 4’s all-time Metacritic scores so far, after almost a year on the market, and very few indeed fall into the red, with a score of 49 or less. Which goes to prove that the mid-tier is becoming the new bottom rung, and going forward no developer can afford to have their game slip into the yellow if they’re to genuinely see a return on not just their hard work, but keep the faith of their number-crunching publishers.
Octodad.
Destiny is okay, Destiny’s fine—it’s not a great game by any means, but its shooting works, and it looks really pretty. You can be a sexy blue lady with a big gun, and that’s cool. It’s less-mainstream, lower budget, more creative efforts like Octodad: Dadliest Catch—metascore, 69 – that can find themselves unfairly marginalized courtesy of being divisive, for having a few nuts and bolts loose despite, generally, being a lot of fun. I guarantee you that playing Octodad will make your life better for half an hour—and if you spent those same minutes on Destiny, you might not even get beyond its hypnotic menus.
So, go on, embrace the mid-tier, and brave some of its yellows. They’re a lot brighter than so many of the formulaic greens above them, and you might even keep a few people in the development game long enough for them to realize your next console obsession.
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The author having her photo taken at London Fashion Week. photos by Henry Gorse
Anyone with pants and a smartphone can be a fashion blogger. Put some clothes on, take a photo of yourself, upload it to Instagram (tagged with #OOTD for easy clarification) and follow it up with a picture of some ladybird nail art or a bottle of aloe vera juice. There you go: you did it! You’re basically Tavi Gevinson!
If you really want, you could always round that off with a vlog of your latest department store haul and a $20 liploss giveaway, and you’d be well on your way to 8,000 Twitter followers and a paid Mooncup banner ad.
However, that side of fashion blogging is essentially just pointing your iPhone at a mirror. Where it gets slightly trickier is managing to disseminate your personal brand onto blogs that you don't operate yourself—blogs run by people who write guest columns in weekend supplements and splash the best part of their fee on camera lenses they don't really need.
Ahead of Fashion Week, I set myself a challenge: spend £10 ($16) a day on the dumbest outfits I could put together, and see if I could get papped by one of those people. Granted, Fashion Week is the largest annual gathering of street style bloggers, so the chances of having your photo taken are tripled by merely turning up and loitering near the Vitaminwater fridge.
But my thinking was that if I—a 22-year-old who accessorizes with Lord of the Rings paraphernalia and yellowing festival wristbands – could make my way onto a fashion blog, then so could anyone.
On the Friday morning, Henry—the photographer—and I went on the hunt for outfits. Turns out charity shops in my neighborhood aren’t cheap. We drained a whole day’s budget on a fake Liverpool jacket, some vanilla New Look heels and a few crispy pairs of men’s socks.
But once we got to East London's Brick Lane, and its abundance of Bangladeshi mini-marts and off licenses, our luck changed. There was a bunch of bargain bucket stuff that I’d never seen under one roof before—plastic handcuffs, bindis, imported intimate wash. Cultural appropriation can come at a staggering cost, but here it was pocket change.
After picking up some shimmery silver material and a roll of pink and purple synthetic fur—both of which I intended to turn into something vaguely wearable—we were fast running out of cash, so we checked some dumpsters for freebies. Lucky for us, people just don't seem to care about broken neon glasses and barely functioning alarm clocks as much as they used to, so into the bags they went.
On top of Henry’s roof, the wind in my fur, I looked the worst I’d ever looked in my life. Like a bloated Furby at a Shitdisco concert.
Still, I had a job to do, so I spent the entire tube journey to central London imagining we were off to the launch of a new Peruvian restaurant (very fashion, according to some of the blogs I'd researched) in an effort to get into character.
Walking through the arches to the Somerset House courtyard, it was exactly as I’d imagined: flustered PRs waving clipboards, bewildered European tourists and lots of well-dressed people pretending to check their phones, glancing up any time someone with a DSLR came within snapping distance.
As I trotted around, a few photographers began to perk up. “Are you a blogger?” they asked. “Yes,” I lied.
Some asked where my pieces were from. I told them most of my outfit was vintage Vivienne Westwood, because she’s the only one I know. They all nodded enthusiastically, and one man said, “Oh yes, I remember this bag. A big one that year.”
I know women’s lifestyle mags always harp on about statement pieces, but I could never have predicted the reaction my plug necklace got. Everyone wanted to know where I’d bought it, and most seemed genuinely impressed when I told them I’d made it myself.
‘This fashion business is very strange,’ I thought, as someone handed me a free bottle of “beauty water” that supposedly contained collagen and looked a bit like the glitter body sprays I used to buy from Claire’s. I had a sip. I didn’t feel any more beautiful, but it did make my mouth foamy.
I was pleased with the first day’s progress; people were taking me seriously, despite the fact that I was wearing one knee-length golfing sock and holding an alarm clock. But with only five or six portraits under my belt, I knew I could do much better.
On the Monday (I skipped Saturday and Sunday, because the weekend is for sleeping and avoiding central London) I had no real statement pieces to catch anyone's eye—just some thigh-high socks, short-shorts and very old football gear.
However, I'd been researching some blogs for posing tips and was confident enough in my newfound ability that I didn't have to resort to the traditional hallmarks of an online couture queen, like England beanies or wearable plug sockets. All I had to do was tilt my head down, smile coyly and slump, with my hand resting wherever felt sassiest.
It worked like a charm as soon as I arrived.
These two really took to my socks, presumably not noticing the well-baked stains that were scratching away at my thigh.
For the whole time I was there, I felt like bonafide blogger royalty, as gross as that sentence is. Twice as many people approached me – perhaps because my outfit wasn't quite as shit (I've seen people actually dressed like this in Camberwell and Clapton)—and when I got back to work everyone said I looked cool, which never happens.
By the final day, I’d decided to go all out. No more fuzzy DIY jumpers or Sports Direct archives; on Tuesday, I was all about high fashion. The one black glove was something I thought might be cool in the fashion world, before realising (on arrival at Somerset House) that it's probably not cool in any world.
Henry thought I needed black lipstick, but we didn’t have any budget left for Barry M, so I used my Collection 2000 liquid eyeliner instead.
Stepping through the arches for the last time, a PR for a large chain of high street hairdressers recognized me and took me aside. Thirty minutes later, I was out of my brief VIP experience with a goodie bag full of stuff and some weird, temporarily dyed hair.
Drunk on the free prosecco rolling around my empty stomach, I went for a walk around the cobbles.
Multicoloured hair and silver capes are clearly in right now—photographers were flocking to me like hungry freelancers around the canapés at a press launch.
In fact, the only time I ran into any problems was when people started asking for my blog address. Thinking on my feet, I swatted them off with some incomprehensible mumbles about copycat accounts and advertising issues, and asked them to just tag my Instagram account instead.
Around this point, as a man got very close to my face to shoot “some detail”, a passing boy in a leather cloak called me a “wannabe cunt”. Which I didn’t think was very fair. Frankly, by now I was anything but a wannabe; at least 30 photographers thought my $16 outfits were proficient enough to justify pointing at camera at them.
Though it did make me wonder, did anyone actually think I looked good, or were they just pretending to get it? Was the guy sashaying shade in my direction right—a sartorial truther blowing my lies wide open?
Whatever the answer to that very important question, I know one thing for sure: that the whole experience was nauseatingly self-indulgent. But very fun all the same; it’s no wonder so many people want in.
For most, of course, it’s a pretend job—a façade to bolster their online validation, to trick their Instagram followers into believing they regularly receive goodie bags full of revitalizing hair mist and Givenchy tote bags, or whatever it is these people get excited about. That said, become one of the blogging elite and it might be your ticket to a branding/PR/DJ gig that could fund your Friday nights until you’re at least 25.
Unfortunately, doing that is slightly harder than I first thought. Which obviously makes a lot sense—I neglected the whole setting up a blog and building a fan-base thing, and focused far too hard on perfecting my resting bitch face in the hope that someone established would take my picture, allowing me to just rise through the ranks off the back of that. But for all the photos people took of me, I couldn't find one on any of the blogs I'd set out to make. Turns out people who've spent eight years running highly successful blogs have some kind of editorial policy that excludes anyone clearly fucking with them.
So what did I learn about the world of fashion blogging? That it’s a pastime no different from any other I’ve come across. Believe your own hype, and you can be anyone you want to be.
Photo via.
From London's Soho to San Francisco's Castro district, most metropolitan cities boast an area where gay men can walk down the street wearing chapless trousers in peace, and where lesbians can get their bikes fixed by other lesbians.
Amin Ghaziani is a professor in sociology and the author of a new book entitled There Goes the Gayborhood?. Taking him six years to complete, it's a comprehensive look at how these enclaves of acceptance come to be, what their main characteristics are, and how they have changed over time, whether it be through degeneration or gentrification.
The book prompts questions for gay and straight people alike; "As society in the UK and US gradually become more accepting of homosexuality, is there still a need for these "safe spaces"?" "What if I'm gay but don't care about living near other gay people?" "Where the hell should I invest my hard earned pink pounds?"
We caught up with Professor Ghaziani in search of some answers.
VICE: Hey Amin. I guess it makes sense to start at the beginning – how do "gayborhoods" come about?
Amin Ghaziani: Gay neighborhoods began to form following World War Two when many gay men and lesbians were discharged from the military as result of their real or perceived homosexuality. Rather then returning home disgraced, many chose to remain behind in port cities or major metropolitan areas. These areas then flourished in the 1970’s and 1980’s, during a period that demographers refer to as the ‘Great Gay migration', whereby individuals who were living in small satellite towns perceived the gay districts in major cities as a beacon of tolerance in a sea of heterosexual hostilities.
The Castro, San Francisco. Photo via Wikimedia Commons
What are the defining characteristics of a ‘gayborhood’?
Gay neighborhoods have four defining characteristics. They have a distinct geographic focal point: in other words, locals and tourists can point it out on a map, usually by identifying one of two specific streets. They have a unique culture: LGBT individuals set the tone or character of the area, which is why rainbow flags are visible as you walk along its streets. They have a concentration of residences: although not everyone who lives in a gay neighborhood self identifies as gay or lesbian, a statistically sizeable proportion of individuals do. Finally, they have a cluster of commercial spaces and non-profit community organizations, ranging from bars to bookstores to community centers.
How to gayborhoods in the UK differ to those in North America?
You tend to only see three of those four characteristics in London’s Soho. They have a distinct geographic focal point, a unique culture and a cluster of commercial spaces – but the area doesn’t necessarily have the same concentration of residences that you see in major gay neighbourhoods in the United States and Canada. This is probably because London has a effective public transportation system which makes the area accessible to a wide range of individuals.
This isn't the case for all urban districts in the UK however. The gay village in Birmingham developed based on the idea of what economist Alan Collins called “Critical Gay Population Size”. In other words, "birds of a feather flock together”; a gay population beyond a critical threshold becomes a type of amenity that other non-hetrosexuals seek as they make residential decisions. This doesn’t really apply to Soho.
Brewer Street, Soho. Photo via Wikimedia commons
What’s been you experience of living in North American gay neighborhoods?
I have always tried to live in gay neighborhoods. During graduate school I lived in Chicago’s Boystown district. Now I teach at the University of British Colombia in Vancouver and live in the West End, which is also a gay neighborhood.
They appeal to me for a number of reasons. Straight people will always outnumber gay people. That’s just a fact of life. I have always felt it’s nice to live in a place where I can see other people who are like me; where I can see two men holding hands or two women holding hands, where I can see the iconography of the LGBT community as I walk the streets. It’s also easier to meet other gay people.
Do you think it’s about safe spaces too?
I do, yes. This is a very important point. Historically, gay neighborhoods are spatial expressions of a specific form of oppression. If the form of oppression changes so will the spatial expression. So we live in a moment of unprecedented societal acceptance of homosexuality, and as a result the meaning and the composition of these districts are in flux.
Right. So this so-called era of “post-gay” acceptance, could you say that gay neighborhoods are under threat? Or, at least, gay communities are dissipating?
I don’t know if I want to say that they are under threat. That’s an aggressive word. I think that these urban districts are reflections of populations and they are reflections of societal attitudes. The neighborhoods will remain but they may become more of a cultural repository then the safe spaces that they were.
To say that we live in a time of unprecedented societal acceptance of homosexuality is a bit of a generalization anyway, because not all sub groups are equally accepted; crimes against transgender individuals continue at alarming rates and LGBT people of color do not necessarily feel the same levels of acceptance either by straight society or within the LGBT community. We also know that young people who are coming out of the closet still find themselves drawn to these districts. And so many types of individuals feel just a little bit safer in gay neighborhoods than they do beyond its borders.
Photo collage via cultiple Flickr users. Complete credits here
According to your research, gay neighborhoods have a greater tendency to become gentrified. Why is that?
Well research certainly shows that gay men and lesbians play a part in the early stages of urban revitalization. Lesbians actually come first. There is a sociologist in New York who has characterized lesbians as “canaries in an urban coal mine”. They typically seek out areas of the city that are affordable and have a progressive reputation where they can be around others who are like them. They will typically plug into the infrastructure of the area such as progressive coffee shops, co-op grocery stores, bike stores, counter cultural theaters and so on.
Gay men arrive later. Often some of them will feel like they are being pushed out of an existing area because it’s become too expensive or too straight. When they try to figure out where they want to move they say that several lesbians friends of theirs live in a given area so they flock to that area. Gay men rather then utilizing existing resources in a neighborhood tend to build new commercial areas. Bars, home décor stores, and any number of different businesses. That then increases the real estate value of the area.
We also know from economics that, in the US at least, the gayer the block the faster it values will rise. Areas that have large concentrations of same sex households experience greater increases in house prices compared to the national average. More specifically, in areas where male same sex households comprise more then 1% of the population we see approximately 14% increases in housing prices. In areas where female same sex households comprise more then 1% of the population we see a 16.5% increase in price. The national average in comparison is 10%. So clearly areas that have gay and lesbian households will experience greater increases in house prices.
London's Soho during gay pride. Photo by Jamie Lee Curtis Taete
What did you learn/draw from the book?
What drove me to the project was trying to understand why these neighborhoods are changing. One explanation is what I call an expansion of the residential imagination; basically, certain progressive cities are becoming the equivalent of gay neighborhoods. Where, say, once the village was the gay neighborhood in New York, some individuals now say the entire island of Manhattan is gay.
Another thing I learnt is that new areas are forming in cities. There are now more areas that have a distinct association with same sex sexuality then we have ever seen before. We are seeing the emergence of same sex households with children and these families tend to make very similar and systematic decisions about where to live. We are also seeing clusters for LGBT people of color; New Yorkers talk about Chelsea on the one hand and “Chocolate Chelsea" on the other hand, and they talk about “Hells Kitchen” on the one hand and an LGBT Latino “Hells Cocina” on the other. We see distinct settlements for lesbians; a tiny town in Northampton, Massachusetts was dubbed “Lesbianville USA” by the National Enquirer.
So this is one of the biggest surprises in doing the book was to find that there are now so many more areas that plurality is the name of the new game rather then the death and demise of the one and only gay neighborhood.
Thanks Amin.
You can pick up a copy of There Goes the Gayborhood? on Amazon.
Follow Amelia Abraham and Amin Ghaziani on Twitter.
A stone at the Auld Acquaintances Cairn—a project in which people could write messages of unity onto stones and add them to a pile
Yesterday, the UK Independence Party's Nigel Farage, a man who has probably done more than most to foster hatred of English people, complained that “[Scottish National Party leader Alex] Salmond has fueled such vitriol amongst Yes campaigners that we are now seeing intimidation and a growing anti-English sentiment.” He’s not the first person to suggest that. Earlier this summer, broadcaster Jeremy Paxman said that the drive for Scottish independence is a product of a “hatred” of the English. Former Tory cabinet minister John Redwood has called the SNP “anti-English.” But as people go to the polls today, is their disdain for anyone who lives south of the border going to be a big factor?
First, let's ask the question, is Scottish nationalism inherently anti-English? If you dig around the roots of the former, evidence of the latter is not hard to find. Poet Hugh MacDiarmid, a founder member of the National Party of Scotland (which later merged into the present-day SNP), was vitriolic—at times comically so—in his hatred of the Sassenach. In the 1990s, groups like Scottish Watch and Settler Watch were established “to resist the English takeover” through direct action and civil disobedience.
But these fringe groups came to naught. The modern Scottish National Party has been at pains to stress they want to take control of decisions about Scotland away from Westminster, not that they want to swing anyone called Rose or George from a lamppost. A significant number of senior SNP figures are English-born, including at least half a dozen of the party’s contingent in the devolved parliament in Edinburgh and their Westminster leader, Angus Robertson. SNP leader Alex Salmond often talks of Scotland “gaining a friend” south of the border if there is a Yes vote today.
Since the 1980s, around 400,000 English-born people have moved to Scotland. That is an awful lot of voters. You might be forgiven for assuming that they’ll all vote to keep their adopted home linked to their country of birth. But it's not that simple. At the beginning of September, a pro-independence group called “English Scots for Yes,” which claims to have 1,000 members, published an open letter to England that said, “Independence will be good for Scotland, and it will be good for England.”
In Dumfries, in the Scottish borders, I spoke to Mark Falkland, a fiftysomething Lancastrian who moved north with his wife and two children in 1996. “Growing up in Blackburn, I was taught to have a healthy distrust of London and the power it held," he said. "I remember going down as a Liverpool fan in the 80s and having 20-pound notes waved in my face… it’s still like that today, it seems, and this is a chance to break away from that.”
Falkland runs First Base Agency, a charity based in a former bakery beside the River Nith in the center of Dumfries. It offers drug, alcohol, and family-counseling services. “Food donations urgently required,” read a sign in the window when I visited. Last month, they gave out 450 food parcels. Eighteen months ago, that figure was around 100. This huge increase in demand is down to the welfare reforms introduced by the coalition in Westminster, said Falkland. “There is virtually no policy in Edinburgh that affects people’s ability to buy food,” he said.
Places such as Dumfries, in the heart of the Scottish Borders, are home to some of the highest concentrations of English-born people living in Scotland. Falkland believes many of his compatriots will support independence. “The conversation I’ve had with a lot of English people here is: ‘Do you know any English people voting no?’” That said, a recent poll suggests that Falkland's suggestion might say more about his friends than actual demographics, with two thirds of those in the south of Scotland intending to vote no.
The Coldstrem Bridge between England and Scotland. Photo via Flickr user John Denham
When I visited the picturesque border town of Coldstream, the feeling was rather different. A union flag with “Better Together” written across it hung in a window. Northumberland was just a stone’s throw away—literally, if you were really, really good at throwing stones—across the River Tweed, which separates Scotland and England.
“From my standpoint, I don’t see what the benefit [of independence] would be,” said Trevor Brunning, a father of four from North London who owns an army supply store in Coldstream. “Scottish culture is fantastic. So is British. There is too much division in the world. Unity can be good.”
Although he had not experienced anti-English sentiment first hand, Brunning is “concerned” about Anglophobia if Scotland votes for independence. Racially motivated attacks against English people in Scotland are relatively small but statistically significant. Around 5 percent (146 people in total) of complainers or victims of racist attacks in 2012 and 2013 were English. This figure was almost double that of the previous year, although the rise has largely been attributed to a change in how statistics are collected.
Anglophobia does exist in Scotland but is isolated, episodic, and not comparable to other forms of deep-seated racial prejudice, according to research carried out by Murray Watson of Dundee University. Other studies have suggested that English people in Scotland feel more secure since the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999.
English Scots for Yes hold a tea party on the Scottish border. Photo courtesy of English Scots for Yes
Langholm is the birthplace of Anglophobic nationalist bard Hugh MacDiarmid; an obelisk in his honor overlooks the town. In the attractive village of solid stone houses framed by green treeless hills a dozen or so miles from the border, English residents seemed as divided as the rest of the country on the referendum question.
Staffordshire-born Philip Gunn, 63, had few anxieties about voting yes. “As an English person living in Scotland I’ve got no ax to grind. I just think that it would be a great thing for Scotland,” he said when we met in the gallery he runs on Langholm’s main street. One of the reasons he is voting yes, Gunn said, is the hope that independence will provide more employment opportunities in Scotland. Both his children moved south to England for work.
In the local arts center, two middle-aged English men and their Scottish wives were sipping mid-morning coffees. The Borders are renowned for their reserve, but both men, who asked to remain anonymous, expressed concerns about independence. “A lot of people here depend on things in England,” said one, citing the health service and fears about border crossings and pension provision. His friend was worried about the English being blamed for a narrow No vote.
Let’s hope that fear is unfounded. Apart from anything else, it seems that English people in Scotland are just as likely to vote yes as Scots are to vote no.
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This guy really doesn't like black voter registration drives. Photo via Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp's official website
On Wednesday, the state of Georgia suffered a major defeat in its four-year odyssey to win fraud convictions against twelve African American voting organizers in the small town of Quitman. After a grueling five-week trial (and two previous mistrials), a jury cleared the state’s key target, Lula Smart, of all counts of voter fraud. In 2010, Georgia agents arrested and briefly incarcerated Smart and the Quitman group just weeks after they had led an unprecedented surge in the black community’s voting participation, ushering in the first-ever black majority on the local school board. The state has since failed miserably to provide evidence supporting the charges.
The defeat comes as Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State, Brian Kemp, has begun aggressively pursuing another, larger-scale version of the Quitman case. The new investigation, uncovered just last week, targets a massive new voter registration project led by some of the state’s most prominent African Americans. Kemp’s move has revived worries that Republicans in Georgia are raising the specter of voter fraud to cast a pall of criminality on groups that register minorities. And the stakes are high: Democrats say the state’s unregistered 700,000 black voters could turn Georgia into a genuine battleground that’s more competitive in national elections. Kemp’s latest target, The New Georgia Project, has led this effort with eye-popping registration totals statewide. Kemp himself was recently caught candidly saying such efforts could spell doom for Republicans.
For the past week, as Kemp has issued forceful public statements about the group’s alleged fraud, voting organizers in the Atlanta area have scrambled to counter the state’s latest accusations. But on Wednesday afternoon, Kemp’s office astonished voting advocates with the disclosure that, of the more than 85,000 voter applications successfully submitted by the New Georgia Project, just 25 are believed to be forged, according to local news reports. Just like in the Quitman case, the state’s bellicose rhetoric relies on comically scant evidence.
Kemp’s latest investigation probably comes as no surprise to those in Quitman’s black community, where, in 2010, his agents went door-to-door seeking evidence on voter fraud. For weeks, armed state investigators visited residents’ houses, having them sign personal statements the agents had written out for them. Among these households, it is widely believed that the state’s investigation sought to intimidate a minority community that had suddenly begun voting in droves. One resident, for instance, asserted that state investigators threatened her with potential incarceration before having her sign a statement agents had written on her behalf.
Despite the extensive multi-agency investigation in Quitman, the state failed to produce any evidence of actual voter fraud related to the historic local school board election. It instead built its prosecution on proving that Smart and others had violated the law by carrying completed ballots to the mail for close acquaintances and helping elderly voters fill out their forms. Yet, even on these charges, the state had surprisingly little—if any—sound evidence. (This did not stop Georgia’s Republican Governor, Nathan Deal, from stepping in to issue an executive order temporarily removing three African Americans from the local school board.)
In May, VICE spoke with several Quitman residents the state alleged were the victims of voter fraud at the hands of the accused. Each alleged victim interviewed asserted that no such fraud had taken place, and that they had successfully cast ballots in 2010 for the candidates of their choice without any coercion or meddling. For instance, two felony voter fraud charges rely on the state’s assertion that Quitman resident Debra Dennard criminally handled the ballot of her father, David. But Mr. Dennard, who uses a wheelchair and is partially blind, says his daughter cares for him and did nothing wrong. “All she did was help me—just as she helps me with almost everything,” Mr. Dennard told me. “I knew who I wanted to vote for, and I signed the ballot myself.” (A spokesman for the Prosecuting Attorneys' Council of Georgia told VICE that the state accepts Wednesday's verdict and is currently considering whether or not to pursue any further prosecution of the Quitman group.)
Just like in Quitman, Georgia's new round of thunderous fraud accusations have been seized upon by political opponents of the alleged fraudsters. The campaign of David Purdue, Georgia’s Republican US Senate candidate, quickly accused his Democratic rival, Michelle Nunn, and her allies of trying to “steal an election.” Such an assertion may seem premature—until you compare it with the statements of Kemp himself. In a letter to elections officials in the state, Kemp said that, even though the investigation was still in a preliminary stage, his office had discovered “forged voter registration applications, forged signatures on releases, and applications with false or inaccurate information” connected with the New Georgia Project. “We launched a formal investigation and found significant proof of fraud," he said, according to the Marietta Daily Journal.
That the Secretary of State’s office has only found problems with what amounts to a tiny fraction of the New Georgia Project’s registration forms has Georgia’s black community on edge. “It’s frustrating to hear them raise the same hoopla and standing in front of cameras just because there are 25 forms that have some questions about them,” said Francys Johnson, the president of the Georgia NAACP. (Kemp has suggested a couple dozen additional forms are suspicious, but has yet to take the leap of calling them fraudulent.)
Johnson says that groups registering voters are legally required to submit all applications, even if they appear to be flawed. “The law does not afford us the right to throw away an incomplete form—we flag it and we still have to turn it in,” he told me. Along with fellow organizers, Johnson is calling on the secretary of state to put aside the “witch hunt” in order to focus on what they allege are more than 50,000 registration forms Kemp’s office has so far neglected to process.
In Quitman, get-out-the-vote organizers are now racing against the October 6 registration deadline for this fall's elections. It didn't exactly help that they were required to spend the last five weeks in court.
Smart tells me that Wednesday’s verdict affirmed for her a right that many Americans might take for granted.
“It is legal to go door-to-door to people’s houses to get out the vote,” she says. “And that’s what we’re going to keep doing. We already have plans for this weekend.”
Follow Spencer Woodman on Twitter.
Screenshot of Australian law enforcement arresting a suspect in the kidnapping operation via YouTube
Australia's biggest ever anti-terror police raids took place on Thursday morning at 4 AM, as nearly 900 law enforcement officers arrested 15 suspects police say were involved in a plot to kidnap and behead a random citizen in the name of the Islamic State and put the footage of the killing online.
The Australian Federal Police, along with state police and intelligence operatives, hit 25 locations in the outer suburbia of Australia's largest city, Sydney, in a coordinated operation that Prime Minister Tony Abbott said broke up an alleged terror plot. Omarjan Azari, a 22-year-old, was quickly charged at Sydney central local court, where the prosecutor explained the plan was “clearly designed to shock, horrify, and terrify the community.”
The government says that members of the Islamic State (IS or ISIS), the extremists who have taken control of parts of Iraq and Syria and Iraq, ordered or were involved in the plan. The Australian media has mostly run with this narrative, the feeling being that IS has reached Australia's streets. But a senior international security analyst working on the Syrian crisis who spoke to VICE from Lebanon on condition of anonymity said that this story doesn't quite add up.
“It just isn't consistent with any ISIS operations, strategies, or tactics,” the analyst said. “ISIS's philosophy and organization is based on quite traditional ideas of force and warfare, they aim to seize and hold territory in Iraq and Syria. Western countries are still seen as key recruitment grounds and sources of finance, but I don't believe the organization would order a random homicide in a country like Australia.”
The purported ISIS agent who ordered the attack is Mohammad Ali Baryalai, an immigrant from Afghanistan who formerly made a living as a nightclub bouncer in Sydney's party district. He is alleged by authorities to have recruited up 60 people in Australia to travel to Syria and fight for the Islamic State. One of his recruits, Khaled Sharrouf, is now famous for tweeting a photo of his seven-year-old son holding a decapitated head in the conflict zone. (Sharrouf reportedly turned to radical Islam after LSD and amphetamine use exacerbated his mental health problems.)
“Most of the beheadings that ISIS have committed have been internal, almost religious sacrifices,” explained the analyst. “The only cases of beheadings that were committed with external, political, propaganda purposes were two journalists and an aid worker who had been held for up to 18 months—meaning, they were in no rush. This sounds to me like it is more likely someone attempting to emulate what they think ISIS is, rather than someone within ISIS.”
While no terrorist acts have taken place in Australia since the war on terror began, several large raids have thwarted attempted attacks.
The first, in 2005 was foiled by law enforcement, who said Sharrouf and eight others were plotting to bomb several Sydney landmarks the day after Australia's first anti-terror laws were introduced. Sharrouf was charged with possessing items to be used for a terrorist act, including six clocks and 140 batteries he stole from a department store. He was given a sentence of three years and 11 months, while the other eight received up to 15 years.
“You have to bear in mind that his crime, although a serious crime, was a pretty pathetic crime," the judge in the case told a reporter recently. "Stealing some clocks, some batteries, and potato chips from the supermarket doesn't really warrant a long time in jail."
Recalling the case today, prominent Sydney Lawyer Charles Waterstreet described the convicted terrorists as rank amateurs, “to start with they went in and bought hydrogen peroxide in their flowing white robes from the local shops.”
Waterstreet had represented another terror suspect, Belal Khazaal, who at the time of his arrest was accused of authoring a terrorist manual for Australian-based jihadists.
“He basically copied and pasted it together off the internet, it's sort of the equivalent of posting Playboy images to Redtube” Waterstreet said.
Khazaal was handed a 12-year sentence for his manual, won one appeal, and lost a subsequent one that has put him back behind bars.
Australia has generally been a magnet for keyboard jihadis who are inspired, rather than trained by, international terror cells.
“As far as a terrorist plot goes, beheading someone in Sydney doesn't take much more organizing than borrowing 20 dollars to buy an ax from Bunnings,” explained the anonymous analyst, “so as far as a conspiracy, or an ISIS plot goes, it'll be interesting to see how direct that connection is.”
Follow Scott Mitchell on Twitter.
Since beginning his career a decade ago with the Sadness of Joe Jangles, Jeffrey St. Jules has established himself as one Canada’s most fiercely original and off-kilter voices through a series of highly stylized short films packed with wry humour and cheeky experimentation with form.
Jules’s latest film, Bang Bang Baby, fits in neatly with his oeuvre: it’s a genre-twisting musical about big hopes and busted dreams, set in a surreally detailed vision of the 1960s. The film has already debuted to high praise—it garnered the Best Canadian First Feature at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival.
In our latest episode of The Director’s Canvas, we caught up with Jeffrey at his east end home in Toronto to discuss his much buzzed about TIFF feature premiere, his experimental doc for NFB, and the ten-year development process for Bang Bang Baby.
By now, we all know what it means to be a basic bitch. The internet has exhausted the term and its associated cultural trends to such a degree that we might have reached peak basic, the moment when the world can get none more basic and we all just have to stop talking about it. In this period of basic saturation, we decided that it's time to find the ultimate basic—to choose who will lord over the secret Cape Cod bunker that holds a large cache of capri pants, pumpkin spice lattes, rocket launchers, cases of white wine, Norah Jones CDs, crossbows, M-16s, B-vitamins, Voss water, paperback copies of The Goldfinch, and kale chips in case of an attack on America.
To do that, we asked three expert judges to join our Ultimate Basic Bitch panel: Big Freedia, bounce music icon and a queen in her own right; Julie Klausner, comedian and host of the "How Was Your Week" podcast; and VICE staff writer Dave Schilling. After a painstaking process of elimination, we believe we found the Ultimate Basic Bitch. From 32, there can be only one Queen of Basics.
ACTRESS REGION
GWYNETH PALTROW VS. KATE HUDSON – In pre-tournament office surveys, Gwyneth was a strong favorite, thanks to her very posh, very normal life and her penchant for wearing beige. Kate has the sort of face that belongs in a Sears catalogue, but she's also showbiz royalty and was married to the guy from the Black Crows (weird). She barely skates into this tournament.
WINNER: Gwyneth Paltrow (2 to 1)
Big Freedia says: "Oh God, Gwyneth. Her voice puts me to sleep."
ANNE HATHAWAY VS. BLAKE LIVELY – Anne Hathaway dated a grifter, which is not basic. But public opinion is not in her favor right now. Women find her very, very annoying and bland. In 2012, Blake Lively was named one of People magazine's "Most Beautiful at Every Age." We hope she's ready to win yet another prestigious award.
WINNER: Anne Hathaway (2 to 1)
Big Freedia says: "Don't know who either of 'em are."
JULIA ROBERTS VS. KATIE HOLMES – Julia has made a successful career out of being relatable to normal people. My Best Friend's Wedding might be the ultimate basic movie (other than Maid in Manhattan). On the other hand, Katie Holmes's most well-known film role is the generic doomed love interest in a Batman film—which she didn't even get to film the death scene for, because she abdicated from the part before the filming of The Dark Knight.
WINNER: Katie Holmes (2 to 1)
Dave Schilling says: "Had to go with Katie Holmes. Marrying Lyle Lovett is somehow less boring than marrying Tom Cruise."
JENNIFER ANISTON VS. MICHELLE WILLIAMS [WHITE] – Michelle is the Ledger widow, which automatically makes her a dubious choice for this competition. She's here anyway. Deal. Jennifer Aniston is Jennifer Aniston.
WINNER: Jennifer Aniston (3 to 0)
Julie Klausner says: "Jennifer Aniston, because basic bitches across this crapland still ask for her haircut."
POP STARS REGION
BRITNEY SPEARS VS. RITA ORA – Britney singlehandedly made carrying a Starbucks cup while wearing sweatpants cool, but also lost her mind in 2007. Losing your mind is not basic. Rita Ora looks fairly wacky, but that also appears to be a bit of a put-on for the sake of alt cred.
WINNER: Rita Ora (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Rita Ora, by far. If her name weren’t so close to 'Ore-Ida' I wouldn’t even remember her. I just pay attention to things that might be potatoes."
MICHELLE WILLIAMS [BLACK] VS. AVRIL LAVIGNE – It's been hard enough for Michelle these past few years. At least let her win THIS. Avril is married to the lead singer of Nickelback, though it appears they're about to call it quits. Admitting a mistake is not the same as avoiding making that mistake in the first place.
WINNER: Michelle Williams—the Black One from Destiny's Child (3 to 0)
Dave Schilling says: "I wanted to vote for Avril but picked Michelle just because her advancing on a unanimous vote made me laugh."
CARRIE UNDERWOOD VS. HILARY DUFF – These days, "country music icon" is code for "basic." Yeah, you knew Carrie would be here. If you don't understand why Hilary Duff is basic, then we question why you are even reading this article.
WINNER: Hilary Duff (2 to 1)
Big Freedia says: "Hilary Duff. She Disney."
KELLY CLARKSON VS. JESSICA SIMPSON – Kelly Clarkson is like a living, breathing bowl of marshmallows. Jessica Simpson, on the other hand, has a hard-won reputation for ruining football teams with her vagina.
WINNER: Kelly Clarkson (3 to 0)
Julie Klausner says: "Kelly Clarkson, I guess, but if it were Ashlee Simpson vs. Kelly Clarkson, Ashlee would be the basic-est, with a lip-sync jig to match."
PUBLIC FIGURE/MISC. REGION
KATE MIDDLETON VS. CASEY ANTHONY – Kate Middleton truly is Her Royal Basicness. She is so tasteful that if she showed up in a Katy Perry music video, it would immediately get nominated for a Peabody Award. You might be asking yourself what Casey Anthony is doing in this tournament. She was accused of murdering her daughter, and during her trial, photos of her setting the Orlando nightlife scene on fire were released to the public. I hear your complaints, but every tournament needs an underdog.
WINNER: Kate Middleton (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Kate Middleton! Obviously! Casey Anthony murdered her daughter! Kate Middleton wears hats! This is not a fair bracket."
ELISABETH HASSELBECK VS. LAUREN CONRAD – Elisabeth probably owns stock in Lululemon. Still waiting for LC to display any actual talent. Being famous despite a clear lack of charisma is very basic.
WINNER: Lauren Conrad (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Lauren Conrad. Hasselbeck is hateful human toilet garbage; Conrad is beige in the form of a person."
SHERYL SANDBERG VS. KOURTNEY KARDASHIAN – Sheryl Sandberg is a strong, successful woman brought down by how inspiring she is to people who share inspirational memes on Facebook. It's really not her fault. I'm sorry, Sheryl. Facing off against her is Kourtney Kardashian. Imagine being the least interesting Kardashian. Imagine.
WINNER: Kourtney Kardashian (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Again, not fair. Kourtney is obviously more basic. Just because Sheryl Sandberg knows what Mark Zuckerberg likes on his salad doesn’t mean her accomplishments need to dissipate in the shadow of a reality star."
PIPPA MIDDLETON VS. SURI CRUISE – Could we get a mother/daughter showdown in the final? Could we get two sisters in the final four? Can a child who can't legally drive a hybrid actually be basic?
WINNER: Pippa Middleton (3 to 0)
Big Freedia says: "Pippa, for sure. Suri's gonna have all kinds of issues."
ICONS REGION
AUDREY HEPBURN VS. MOTHER TERESA – The Bob Marley of female celebrities, in that most college girls have her poster on their dorm room wall. Mother Teresa is perfect and good in every way.
WINNER: Audrey Hepburn (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Audrey Hepburn. Major snooze, and responsible for Upper East Side basic bitches in little black dresses who date sociopaths from Goldman Sachs just because, one day, they want to buy a really expensive stroller."
EVA BRAUN VS. SHIRLEY TEMPLE – Gotta be a real beta personality to date the most evil man in history.
WINNER: Eva Braun (3 to 0)
Dave Schilling says: "Eva Braun!"
OLIVA NEWTON JOHN VS. SUSAN BOYLE – Olivia is in this tournament strictly for "Let's Get Physical," both the song and the accompanying music video tragedy. We weep for Susan Boyle.
WINNER: Susan Boyle (3 to 0)
Dave Schilling says: "I dreamed a dream that Susan Boyle would win this tournament. Don't sleep on SuBo!"
JULIE ANDREWS VS. JULIA CHILD – This matchup is kinda like Bosnia vs. Iran in the FIFA World Cup group stage. We just need to get it over with.
WINNER: Julie Andrews (2 to 0, with one abstention)
Julie Klausner says: "Neither one of these bitches are basic! I refuse to vote!"
ROUND 2:
GWYNETH PALTROW VS. ANNE HATHAWAY
WINNER: Gwyneth Paltrow (2 to 1)
Big Freedia says: "Gwyneth is the most boring person on this planet."
JENNIFER ANISTON VS. KATIE HOLMES
WINNER: Jennifer Aniston (3 to 0)
Julie Klausner says: "Jennifer Aniston. Never married into a cult, wears boring outfits the girls you went to high school with think are sexy."
MICHELLE WILLIAMS [BLACK] VS. RITA ORTA
WINNER: Rita Ora (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Too soon to tell, but I guess Rita Ora, just because I've seen many photos of her and I still don't know what she looks like."
KELLY CLARKSON VS. HILARY DUFF
WINNER: Kelly Clarkson (2 to 1)
Dave Schilling says: "Seeing these two together is like taking a big bite of vanilla ice cream covered in peppered gravy. By themselves, they are inoffensive, but having to deal with both at once is an overwhelming experience that is bland and unpleasant at the same time. In this case, I pick gravy over vanilla. Kelly wins."
KATE MIDDLETON VS. LAUREN CONRAD
WINNER: Lauren Conrad (3 to 0)
Julie Klausner says: "Lauren Conrad, who makes me 'Con-sad' when I think of her, but I'm sad for myself because I've wasted my time."
Big Freedia says: "Lauren Conrad. Kate is about to be a queen. I love her."
PIPPA MIDDLETON VS. KOURTNEY KARDASHIAN
WINNER: Kourtney Kardashian (3 to 0)
Julie Klausner says: "Kourtney, who's morally and spiritually invisible."
Big Freedia says: "Kourtney. Isn't she one of the sisters? What's interesting about her?"
AUDREY HEPBURN VS. EVA BRAUN
WINNER: Audrey Hepburn (2 to 0, with one abstention)
Julie Klausner says: "Audrey Hepburn, who's responsible for basic women everywhere wearing black capris."
Big Freedia says: "Never heard of either of them."
JULIE ANDREWS VS. SUSAN BOYLE
WINNER: Susan Boyle (2 to 1)
Dave Schilling says: "Susan Boyle actually has very serious problems in her life, and we probably should leave her alone. I'm sorry, Susan."
ROUND 3:
GWYNETH PALTROW VS. JENNIFER ANISTON
WINNER: Gwyneth Paltrow (2 to 1)
Dave Schilling says: "Gwyneth. This was a total push, but Jennifer Aniston's boyfriend is Justin Theroux, and I guess he's pretty cool. He, like, wears leather jackets on the regular."
KELLY CLARKSON VS. RITA ORA
WINNER: Kelly Clarkson (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Kelly, whom I can picture in jeans you can buy at a grocery store."
Dave Schilling says: "American Idol winner. Basic Bitch Champion. Has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? I say Kelly. By the way, I highly recommend revisiting From Justin to Kelly. If I ever chose to slowly end my life, Nic-Cage-in-Leaving-Las-Vegas-style, this would be the movie I'd drunkenly fall asleep to. There'd be no chance I'd wake up having second thoughts about deliberately killing myself through alcohol poisoning."
LAUREN CONRAD VS. KOURTNEY KARDASHIAN
WINNER: Lauren Conrad (3 to 0)
Julie Klausner says: "Lauren Conrad. OG of Basic. Poster girl for nothing."
Dave Schilling says: "Kourtney's sister might be O. J. Simpson's love child with Kris Jenner. That makes her slightly edgier, just by association with a convicted felon. LC takes this one by a nose. Kourtney Kardashian's old nose."
AUDREY HEPBURN VS. SUSAN BOYLE
WINNER: Audrey Hepburn (2 to 1)
Julie Klausner says: "Audrey is basically the high priestess of basic because of all the lame girls in ballet flats she inspired."
FINAL FOUR:
GWYNETH PALTROW VS. KELLY CLARKSON
WINNER: Gwyneth Paltrow (2 to 1)
Big Freedia says: "Gwyneth, child. Come on."
Julie Klausner says: "Gwyneth is sort of a John Waters villain. Like, I could see her sucking on David Lochary's toes."
AUDREY HEPBURN VS. LAUREN CONRAD
WINNER: Lauren Conrad (3 to 0)
Julie Klausner says: "Lauren Conrad. Because in five years, or five minutes, you could show somebody who sees her every day a photo of Lauren Conrad, and they'll be like, Who is that?"
Big Freedia says: "I'll say Lauren Conrad. She one of those famous girls with no talent?"
FINALS:
GWYNETH PALTROW VS. LAUREN CONRAD
ULTIMATE BASIC BITCH QUEEN: Gwyneth Paltrow (2 to 1)
Was there ever a question? Gwyneth is the Beyoncé of basics—we can pretend like the rest of the contenders have a chance, but the book has already been written. When even Martha Stewart comes out to throw shade in your direction, it's time to stop fighting your true nature and ascend to the throne. Sometimes, the cream does rise to the top.
Congratulations, Queen Gwen! May your reign bring tasteful home decor and unsolicited life advice to the world!
This cute kitten can generate enough energy to keep a 11 Watt light bulb on for about 56 hours. Image via Wikimedia
The vet did her best, but it wasn’t enough. Your hamster Dave has just passed away. How do you process the death of your favorite pet? Actually, let me be more exact: how do you process Dave’s little corpse? In the Netherlands, the vet can give you three options: burial, cremation or "the Destructor".
According to Dutch website watisdestructie.nl the Destructor is basically a sophisticated meat grinder that turns dead animals into biomass energy. Beware: The site is not for the faint hearted—it contains a video of a white horse being tossed into the colossal contraption.
Rendac Son is the company that handles all "destructions" in the Netherlands. As stated on their website they specialize in “the innovative and sustainable processing of particular organic waste and animal by-products.” In other words, they recycle dead animals. Rendac Son is a branch of Texas-based company Darling Ingredients International—a very wise name choice considering the fact that their eco-friendly industry runs on cute animals.
Rendac Son is also employed by the government to technically be a huge garbage disposal, except they deal with dead animals instead of garbage. According to Dutch law, citizens are obligated to toss horses, cows, pigs and sheep that aren’t for consuming into the Destructor. The fate of pet animals like cats and dogs is in the hands of the owner. Ellen, an employee at the animal hospital in Amsterdam explained to me that the number of people who choose the destructor isn't insignificant: “About half of Dutch pets get cremated, predominantly cats and dogs. The other half—mostly smaller pets—are processed by the government.”
I thought that was just a nice way of saying "they get chewed up by the big metal teeth of the destructor" but Rendac’s Tom Doomen explained what the process exactly entails: “The cadavers are grinded, burnt, sterilized and divided. That leaves us with water, animal meal (protein) and fat. We use the fat as fuel for our own machines and we turn the animal meal into biomass energy which we sell to energy companies.”
They generate a whole load of power too: “We annually process 400,000 tons of cadavers, from which we generate enough energy to supply 55,000 households for an entire year. That’s the equivalent of sucking 180,000 tons of carbon dioxide out the sky."
Tom was also kind enough to inform me that the horror site featuring the majestic white horse getting grinded into oblivion doesn’t belong to Rendac. “That video of the horse was a bit unnecessary, if you ask me. I heard that site was set up by an animal crematorium.”
Some animal crematoriums on the other hand, think that Rendac is covering-up the harshness of their mincing process—though you’d think the name of the machine is a bit of a give-away. SHCN Dierenuitvaart, the oldest and biggest Dutch crematorium, links to the Watisdestrictie website: “We want to be completely transparent towards the consumer, that's why we placed that link,” said Gert-Jan van Dongen, CEO of SHCN.
Van Dongen also said: “Rendac should be clear about what the destructor actually does to animals. We get phone calls every week from people who are inconsolable after finding out what happened to the cadaver of their beloved pet.”
Whatever one thinks about the crudeness of the destructor, it does generate energy from a "natural" source, while a cremation only uses energy, right? So what are we all bickering about?
“The ethical debate is an interesting one," adds van Dongen. "You could, for example, decide to put all the animals in the destructor, for the sake of the environment. But if so, why draw the line there? Rationally speaking, we could also consider throwing human corpses into the machine. But we’re not going to do that, are we?”
Who knows; Putin is turning the gas tap off and the Middle East is burning—an energy crisis could be just around the corner.
Detroit's finest. Photo by Laura Goins via Flickr
On a chilly November morning last year, at least 150 federal, state, and local law enforcement officers swarmed the Colony Arms apartment complex on Detroit’s eastside for “Operation Clean Sweep.” While the raid was initiated by the Detroit Police Department, back up was considered vital—since January 2013, the department had received an estimated 600 phone calls from residents of the public housing unit who reported a range of illicit activity, from drug activity to assault and gun shootings.
By the afternoon, 33 people had been arrested, cuffed in zip ties, and loaded onto an electric blue Detroit Police Department bus. The raid was celebrated and lauded as a success by mainstream media—a PR-coup and reputation boost that DPD desperately needed.
Since 2003, the department had been under the federal oversight of the US Department of Justice, and shaking its bad rap had been proving difficult. After years of articles dissecting the department’s dismal response time, botched raids, and use of excessive force—issues that precipitated the federal intervention—Colony Arms felt like a win, signaling a shift in the public’s perception, or at the very least the media’s interpretation, of the embattled police department.
“This starts the wave of what the new DPD is all about,” Police Chief James Craig, who had been on the job for only four months at the time, told WXYZ Detroit after the raid.
Less than a month later, Craig initiated a raid of another public housing complex, in which 42 people were arrested. Two weeks after that, on December 17, some 300 officers and law enforcement agencies flooded one-square-mile-area of the city’s west side for “Operation Mistletoe” – a raid that at the time was celebrated for being the biggest in the department’s history. And the raids only got bigger. “Operation Restore Order”—as the cumulative initiative was called—launched monthly assaults on the crime-ridden city. By the time I met with Assistant Chief James E. White and Commander DeShaune Sims last week at the Detroit Public Safety Headquarters, the “new DPD” had conducted “nine or ten operations,” and, according to White, the was in the process of planning another one.
From an outside perspective, DPD has come a long way since 2000 when the Detroit Free Press published an investigation titled "Detroit Cops are Deadliest in U.S." The department overcame a massive hurdle last month, when a judge announced the department would begin transitioning out of federal oversight, after 11 years of reporting to the DOJ. The announcement was a recognition of strides that the DPD has made since the DOJ ordered the federal oversight as a result of issues of excessive force, unconstitutional confinement conditions, and the illegal detention of witnesses. Deplorable holding cells have been shut down, new training procedures—including firearms training—have been implemented, and a Civil Rights Integrity Bureau has been created. Between 2009 and 2014, the DPD saw 18 fatal shootings by police officers, down from 48 between 1995 and 2000. But while the question of “deadliest” may be off the table, new questions are arising: What will be the legacy of the “new” DPD? Can excessive force take other forms?
Craig’s zero-tolerance policing style goes beyond raids: It is a defining factor in the department’s “new” agenda. According to White, who has been with the department for 18 years, the DPD’s five main priorities right now are (in no particular order): Homicide reduction, improving response times, graffiti elimination, narcotics enforcement, and vice.
Given the magnitude of Detroit’s municipal issues—the city often draws comparisons to war-torn areas like Baghdad and Beirut—it may come as a surprise that police would chose to focus on petty crimes like graffiti and prostitution. But the department sees these seemingly minor issues as “Quality of Life” problems that, if left unchecked, will balloon into far bigger offenses.
“We go out and do drug raids—that’s a quality of life issue. But then we go out to the local party stores in the area and if they are selling loose cigarettes or the store is dirty then they are cited for that as well,” White explained. “You have to approach crime almost as a holistic approach, where you have to look at every aspect of the community and what’s happening in the community. Some people would laugh and say, what difference does it make if the store is clean? Well, if the store is dirty and there is no investment by that storeowner to have a clean-store that is welcoming to regular, everyday, working class people, then you’re going to draw only the people who may be looking to do what’s not necessarily a good thing.”
What White has described—targeting “dirty” liquor stores to shutdown other more illicit enterprises—is the practical application of what is known as “broken windows” policing, a theory that was first applied by New York Police Commissioner William Bratton during the Giuliani administration in the 1990s. While the strategy is credited with lowering the city’s crime rates, it is also blamed for spawning the “stop-and-frisk” policies that have been criticized for disproportionately targeting and criminalizing minorities.
White and Sims are obviously aware of these connotations. While they had been open and easygoing for most of our interview, they both seemed ill at ease when I mentioned "broken windows."
“So I just want to clarify with broken windows we don’t work with Dr. Kelling,” said White, referencing the criminologist and social scientist George Kelling who coined the “broken windows” theory and who has previously been brought in as a consultant for DPD. “We have talked with him, we don’t have a team that’s on the ground with Dr. Kelling doing broken windows theory enforcement activities.”
But while the department’s relationship with Kelling may have ended, it is one of various steps Detroit has taken to implement Kelling’s ideas about policing. For example, in2012 and 2013 the DPD partnered with the conservative Manhattan Institute to test out “broken windows” strategies in two of the city's high-poverty areas. And prior to coming to Detroit, Craig served under Bratton while the latter was head of the Los Angeles Police Department. (Bratton has since resumed his former position in New York, where he is once again leading the push for “broken windows” policing.)
For Detroit, like New York, “broken windows” has also had a serious downside, particularly for the black community, which makes up 82 percent of Detroit’s population. A recent article in The Guardian,“Bratton-style policing means more fines and arrests for black residents of Detroit,” cuts right to the point, arguing that while “broken windows policing,” or, as the DPD prefers, “Quality of Life Policing,” may make middle-class, mostly-white, young professionals feel better about the city, the policies affect black citizens at disproportionate rates. One could argue, as the Guardian did, that this is the result of racial profiling.
White was quick to shutdown any implications that race factored into the DPD’s strategy. “It’s not race or gender specific,” he told me. “It deals with the issues that have been shown to be problematic in the community.” But the reality is that there are bigger, systemic issues that go far beyond racial profiling: Detroit is one of the most racially segregated cities in the nation, and the areas pinpointed for “Quality of Life” policing tend to be predominantly black neighborhoods. And in a raid there is very little distinction between who is and is not a criminal. If you live in a “problematic community” than you get treated like a “problematic citizen.”
Take for example the same WXYZ Detroit video that featured Craig’s comments about the “new DPD.” Spliced in between a montage of DPD guns, shiny cop cars, and cuffed men and women there was an interview with a Colony Arms resident named Sharrie Freeman. The general celebratory mood of the report and words below her name “Glad to See Police” make it easy to miss what she is saying. “My door actually got kicked in while I was there with my two year old son,” Freeman tells the reporter. She wasn’t alone. With police on every floor of the building and guards in front of the elevators, Colony Arms, where 90 percent of residents are black, was “stop-and-frisk” on a massive scale. Everyone was a suspect, everyone’s name was run through the system and every violation was treated with zero tolerance.
So who were the people arrested at Colony Arms? Cassandra Grimes is one of them. On Nov. 15, 2013, the mother of three had just returned home from a doctor’s appointment and was in the midst of making breakfast when police started banging on the door. Frightened, she woke up her boyfriend Darren Reese-Brown, urging him to hide in the closet. After getting out of prison earlier that year, Reese-Brown had ditched his mandated Supervised Independent Living (SIL) residence to stay with Grimes, and they were both nervous that his slip-up had instigated the unexpected visit.
“What’s your name? What’s your name?” the police questioned when she finally opened the door. Fearful of repercussions and distrustful of the police, Grimes bit her tongue. The officers were forced to search for their own clues. Her Food Assistance-Bridge Card was sitting on the kitchen table and it didn’t take long for the mystery to be solved. “Yep! That’s her!” one of them excitedly announced.
Grime’s name was repeated into a walkie-talkie, run through the system and within minutes she was being led away. Her crime? Failing to show up to a Warren County court after getting a ticket for marijuana possession.
Grimes spent the next ten hours in Detroit County Jail before being reunited with her boyfriend and children that night. She was 8-and-a-half months pregnant and required medical care upon release.
This experience is common in raid settings, said Mark Jay, the co-founder of the Detroit literary magazine The Periphery who co-wrote an essay on the raid with Grime’s boyfriend Reese-Brown, who he met while teaching a prison creative writing class. The majority of the arrests were for “petty crimes,” he claimed, such as outstanding warrants for traffic tickets and possession marijuana. With zero-tolerance, everyone gets lumped together. In fact, according to Jay, all but three of the residents rounded up in the raid and paraded in front of the cameras were released by the following Monday. By then, Colony Arms was back to business as usual, with the bigger issues plaguing the community still largely unaddressed.
“One thing we were trying to talk about in the article is that the police used that there were 600 calls to the building to justify the raid but the fact that they weren’t responding to calls in the first place is the reason it got up to 600 calls,” Jay explained. “So the police, they’re inaction is what justifies the raid and then the media says, ‘Oh! There are 600 calls, these people are animals, the police have to come in.’ But it’s like what do you expect people to do? Without the blanket of security from the police you can’t still have your moral code.”
When I brought up some of these issues to White he seemed surprised.
“I think you’re asking a lot of the police officers who were on the raid to discern who— when you talk constitutional policing, the scales of justice, you’re blind,” White explained. “You have to go in, you have to treat everyone equal. I would venture to say more than 30 people were stopped that day in the Colony Arms. I would venture to say those people that did not have petty crimes or warrants out for their arrest were not arrested. But those people who had missed court appearances, some people had felony warrants, those people were arrested.”
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