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VICE Vs Video Games: Telltale Has Been Given the Keys to the Marvel Universe

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Promotional imagery for the 2012 movie 'The Avengers,' via Wikipedia

Telltale Games has announced a new partnership with comics supergiant Marvel to create adventure games based on its huge stable of characters. The first of these is due in the year 2017, which may feel like a sci-fi setting now, but Marvel has a history of making grand plans stretching into the future, with its current slate of movies locked in all the way to 2019. Should the human race survive that long.

The world of Marvel will be a very different place in 2017, but that doesn't stop me from speculating on where these games will be set—or where they should.

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The New Marvel Universe

This summer, the Marvel comics universe is changing. Starting in May, Marvel's parallel universes, inhabited by similar but different versions of all your favorite heroes and villains, will be merged into one big Battleworld. After the event concludes in December there will be just a single Marvel universe. We've already seen glimpses of what this universe will look like, with a new, diverse Avengers line-up, but there are still many secrets yet to be revealed.

Setting a Telltale adventure during the Secret Wars themselves would be unworkable, thanks to the sheer number of characters, each with their own backstories. Players would be crushed under the weight of decades of history.

When the dust settles, however, and the new status quo is established, this could be a perfect setting for one of Telltale's titles—and a great introduction to the comic universe for new readers. Whatever that may ultimately look like.

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To Infinity and Beyond

The Cinematic Universe is directly responsible for propelling Marvel into the mainstream. It's the reason your average person knows what an Avenger is, never mind a Guardian of the Galaxy. Subsequent TV shows like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Daredevil, and Agent Carter are all set within the same framework, creating a huge multifaceted world that continues to grow. It just makes sense for Telltale to set themselves within this established timeline—if only because it's likely to draw a bigger crowd.

But which film? The Avengers feels like the obvious choice. Take advantage of the ensemble cast, all of whom players who have seen the movies will be familiar with. Flesh out that universe with a slower paced, episodic adventure that takes advantage of the more intimate conversations found in Telltale games. Supplement the narrative, rather than rehashing it.

In 2017 three Marvel films are being released: Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Thor 3: Ragnarok, and Black Panther (actually, the latter seems to have moved to 2018). Any one of these films could tie-in well with a Telltale release. Of all of them, however, Guardians of the Galaxy 2 would probably be the most fun fit. It's likely to draw the biggest audience, plus it features a walking, talking tree. Who, ironically, will probably have the least branching dialogue of any Telltale character to date. "I am Groot," indeed.

Better yet, get the film writers involved with the planning and lay some groundwork for part one of Infinity War, which is out in early 2018. Really open up that Cinematic Universe as wide as it will go.

Whether Marvel is willing to allow the canon of the Cinematic Universe to be wielded by a third party like that remains to be seen, but with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Agent Carter, and Daredevil all tying together, there's a precedent set already. Just not in games.

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Fitz Won't Remember That

Of all the items on this list, Marvel's various TV offerings may be the most appropriate for Telltale to co-opt. They're slower, more thoughtful, and have an emphasis on dialogue over action. Not only that, but they're also much more grounded stories.

By switching the perspective from "superhero" to "civilian among superheroes," TV plays with the Marvel universe in ways that the movies can't. ABC's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Agent Carter, for example, focus on S.H.I.E.L.D. agents across various time periods. None of the protagonists have special powers (recent S.H.I.E.L.D. events notwithstanding), which feels to me to be a perfect way to position Telltale's games.

It already works nicely for Tales From The Borderlands, in which the main characters are exploring the world of Pandora without the heavy weaponry or special abilities possessed by the main series's Vault Hunters. These big guns pop up from time to time, almost as special guest appearances. Celebrities in their own world, thanks to a level of dramatic irony the "civilian protagonists" allow. It's a fantastic way to build on the world of Borderlands beyond the FPS games.

Perhaps more importantly, these Marvel shows are directly affected by the events of the films. What happened in Captain America: The Winter Soldier had a profound impact on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and almost turned it into a completely new show. Wouldn't it be fun if the same could be said for Telltale's games—that they could exert the same influence on Marvel's stories in other media?

It's not clear whether Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. or Agent Carter are getting third and second seasons, respectively, though there are rumblings of a S.H.I.E.L.D. spin-off. By 2017 the Marvel TV landscape could be completely different. Nevertheless, a more "real-world" Telltale adventure based on a TV show, itself set on the periphery of the movie universe, could work perfectly. Between three films a year, multiple TV shows, and Telltale's games filling in further gaps, Marvel could have a constant, year-round storytelling cycle. Just as it does with its comics.

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Tales from Hell's Kitchen

The recent Netflix adaptation of Daredevil blew everyone away with its incredible fight scenes, street-level superhero antics and dark, mature tone. While technically part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it has a very different feel to the movies and ABC's TV offerings—one that would fit much better with Telltale's own stylized and often gritty approach.

Daredevil was so well received that Netflix has already announced a second season, despite initially intending to develop only one. The plan was to create one season each of Daredevil, A.K.A. Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and Iron Fist before bringing them together in an ensemble show called The Defenders. The schedule isn't fixed, but The Defenders could well air in 2017, providing a perfect tie-in opportunity for Telltale.

Forgetting his friends for a moment, a game based on Daredevil alone could also be perfect for Telltale. Juxtapose some street-level fisticuffs with courtroom-based lawyering and you've got two of Telltale's favorite things: action QTEs and dialogue trees. It'll be like L.A. Noire meets Ace Attorney. Except you're blind.

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Marvel's Forgotten Children (of the Atom)

The X-Men are having a bit of a rough time lately. Thanks to ongoing disagreements between Marvel and Fox, who currently own the film rights to the X-Men, it appears their invitation to the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been lost in the mail. Marvel seems to be positioning the Inhumans as the new mutants, if the recent events of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and upcoming post-Secret Wars comic The Uncanny Inhumans are anything to go by. (Uncanny X-Men being the longest-running X-Men comic series, soon to be hitting its 600th issue. Using the "Uncanny" title for an Inhumans comic feels like a statement.)

Despite the movie license woes, there's nothing stopping Telltale from creating an X-Men game. Activision's licensing of the IP expired early last year.

An X-Men-based Telltale title could happily sit separate from the MCU, giving the writers a huge amount of freedom. Perhaps it could be set during the classic era of the 1990s cartoon, or focus on the smaller, original crew from the 1960s. Or it might play with Joss Whedon's excellent Astonishing X-Men comics series. Or perhaps even the 1975 reboot which introduced the likes of Nightcrawler, Colossus, and Wolverine. Or...

As you can see, the scope is massive. But Telltale has a great track record of taking a franchise and creating something new with it, so even if they create something that isn't wholly original using the X-Men characters, you can be sure of a few surprising twists nonetheless. (And as long as it's not set during the films, everyone's happy.)

None of the Above

Having said all that, both Telltale's The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us adaptations take established comics and create something completely new. They have their own twisted versions of familiar characters. They feature new settings and scenarios never before seen in the films or the comics. Thanos in The Avengers? Sure, why not. A female Thor? Nah, it'll never happen.

Follow Jem on Twitter.


Death, Lawrence Phillips, and the Lawless Cornhuskers Team That No One Could Beat

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Death, Lawrence Phillips, and the Lawless Cornhuskers Team That No One Could Beat

The Sensational Architecture of the Strangest Village in Lebanon

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The Pyramid House , Miziara, Lebanon. All photos by Gaia Squarci

Follow the road meandering through endless olive tree fields. Ask for directions again and again to old men chatting on the side of the road at an Abi Nasr cafe. Make a detour through Ehden, and you'll finally reach what looks on first sight like a typical town in northern Lebanon.

Across the welcome sign at the entrance of Miziara stands a life-size nativity scene with a hundred or more figures. Barely half a mile away, the panorama becomes even more surreal—there are a few extravagant examples of megalomaniac architecture in California, but none competes with those one finds in Miziara.

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114221.jpg' id='46365'] The Airplane House

Built in 1975, the most flamboyant of all local buildings is the Airplane House. Two floors, 30 portholes on each side, a short and roundish nose cone, two reactors on each wing; it's a detailed copy of an Airbus A380, until you get to the tail—the circle of stars of the European Union's flag has been transformed into a small window hosting a statue of Virgin Mary.

Up the dirt road sits in state what promises to be a proper Greek temple slowly taking shape amid piles of wide marble stones waiting to be cut and installed. Next door, another undaunted architect has assembled towers of all shape and size in a habitat-like structure that looks made out of random Lego pieces.

"People like to do something different and they have the power to. So, they just do it," says Miziara resident Joseph Chagoury when asked to explain how this modest Christian village turned into a touristic curiosity. His brother built another of Miziara's wonders down the hill in the 90s, referred to as the "Pyramid House," for reasons you can probably guess. Chagoury's own construction project was a relatively conventional, though luxurious, hotel. He's also one of the town's biggest boosters."We are in love with Miziara," he says. "Everyone is from here, so we are expanding but not changing the soul and face of Miziara. It's progress."

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114381.jpg' id='46366'] A rug inspired by ancient Egypt in in a bedroom at the Pyramid House

Architecture is a hobby only the wealthy can play at, and these structures would be impossible without a few extremely well-off residents. A relative of Joseph's, Gilbert Chagoury, is probably the most famous figure connected to the village—he made hundreds of millions of dollars in Nigeria during the 90s, allegedly through corruption schemes. Today his shadow looms large over the town: A 2010 Frontlinestory said that "most Miziarans old enough to work are employed by the Chagourys in Nigeria" nine months out of the year, and the most ostentatious homes are set along Nigeria Avenue.

Some of the Miziarans who venture out of the country don't come back, which is why Joseph Chagoury has started to offer money to second- or third-generation emigrants to return to the village, discover their culture, and apply for Lebanese citizenship. In the meantime, he advocates for the development of tourist-friendly attractions that would make Miziara a destination for foreign travelers. He tells me that the village recently secured money from the government to expand, which probably means there will be more bizarre structures shooting up out of the ground soon.

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114523.jpg' id='46369']Nigeria Avenue

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114554.jpg' id='46371']A private pool under construction

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114618.jpg' id='46374']Construction in progress for a building in the shape of a Greek temple

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114663.jpg' id='46375']Greek temple construction materials

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114697.jpg' id='46376']The Airplane House seen from a distance

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114733.jpg' id='46377']

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114767.jpg' id='46378']A private basketball court in the backyard of the Pyramid House

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429114825.jpg' id='46379']The dining room inside the Pyramid House

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429115114.jpg' id='46383']A Christian shrine

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429115087.jpg' id='46381']A fountain with a statue of the Virgin Mary

[body_image width='2000' height='1334' path='images/content-images/2015/04/15/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/15/' filename='a-visit-to-north-of-lebanons-most-extravagant-village-405-body-image-1429115165.jpg' id='46385']The tail of the Airplane House is host to a statue of the Virgin Mary

See more photos by Gaia Squarci on her website, and follow Laurence Cornet on Twitter.

Videos Emerge of Climbers Fleeing Mount Everest Avalanche After Nepal Quake

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Videos Emerge of Climbers Fleeing Mount Everest Avalanche After Nepal Quake

Meet the Man Building Autonomous Kamikaze Swarm Drones for the US Military

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A big explosion, which is what it might look like if weaponized UAVs from the LOCUST project came to fruition and crashed into a target. Photo by Wikipedia user Staff Sgt. Eric Harris

A few days ago the US Navy released a video unveiling a new weapons project called LOCUST. In the space of a minute the system fires up to 30 drones out of a cannon. Once they've left the launching tube they come together autonomously in a "swarm" designed to attack and overwhelm their target through sheer numbers.

The video shows the drones flying in formation before cutting to a CGI animation of them destroying a small settlement that looks like it could be somewhere in the Middle East or Central Asia. From the ground you might expect an attack to look a bit like a colony of seagulls descending on your bag of chips, if all the birds were packed with explosives and detonated on impact.

The LOCUST project—which stands for Low Cost UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) Swarm Technology—is still in development, but the idea of armed drones with a mind of their own thundering directly into someone's home sounds pretty terrifying. Last week the UN held a conference on how to regulate "killer robots" (autonomous weapons) in Geneva, but it's yet to set up any sort of legal framework to control them.

[youtube src='//www.youtube.com/embed/Tsj5VX093MY' width='640' height='360']

The promo video for LOCUST.

I wanted to find out whether we need be worried about projects, like LOCUST, that seem to allow armed robots to operate with less and less human input. Is it a dangerous escalation of Obama's extremely controversial and allegedly illegal drone war, or a PR stunt designed to intimidate US adversaries and help justify huge defense budgets?

I got in touch with Lee Mastroianni at the Office of Naval Research in Virginia, who acts as Technical Manager on the LOCUST project.

VICE: What are the program objectives?
Lee Mastroianni: A lot of people talk about swarming UAVs—we wanted to show we are actually doing this. We are able to create the swarm, which involves the rapid launch of large numbers of UAVs, and then control the swarm in a way that is useful for military operations. You can spit 'em out very, very rapidly.

Are the drones designed to carry weapons or for reconnaissance?
They could be for reconnaissance; they could be weaponized. If you look at the LOCUST video we put online, I used a sample mission... you have a simultaneous strike where weaponized UAVs take [all their targets] out at the same time.

And do they operate in a kamikaze sort of way? They fly into the target and explode?
The UAVs would be the weapon as opposed to a Predator [UAV], which launches other weapons. These are one-way missions.

Once they're in the air, how are they controlled?
That's the second big piece of the demonstration—autonomous control. Once launched, I don't need to talk to the UAVs. They understand what the mission is. They're talking to one another. You want to know what's it up to. You want to control it. You need to. But it isn't a UAV pilot flying it like a remote control aircraft.

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A CGI image of LOCUST drones attacking a settlement.

I spoke to an individual from a military think tank after watching your video. She was skeptical that LOCUST would make it past the necessary trials to be used in the field, especially because of its autonomy.
I'm very confident that I'm addressing the risk adequately so that it will have success. In terms of the next steps to field such a capability there's quite a bit more work that needs to be done.

When I read the press release, the word that really jumped out was autonomous. The idea of autonomous, weaponized UAVs does seem like a departure from the UAVs we see at the moment.
I'm not sure I see as broad a distinction as you do. Safety, in terms of our sailors, our Marines, [is] paramount. This is a major first demonstration in this regard to take it from the idea of just cartoon sketches and people talking about it to, hey, there's a reality associated with this. If it drives the discussion on exactly the kind of things you're bringing up [around autonomy], then that's a good thing.

Is the kind of research going on at the ONR at the moment moving in the direction of more autonomy for UAVs?
Well, the Office of Naval Research is a leader in autonomy science technology and development. The future is manned platforms working with unmanned platforms on the battlefield.


As important as Lee's insight into the project was, I figured it would be worth redressing the balance a little by speaking to someone whose job isn't to design and promote the exact technology we were talking about.

Stephan Sonnenberg is a Clinical Supervising Attorney and Lecturer in Law at Stanford University. He helped to coordinate and co-authored a report on the effects of the drone war on civilians, which can be found on the anti-drone warfare website livingunderdrones.org.

For more on war, watch our doc "It's Like Vietnam All Over Again":

VICE: Have you seen the LOCUST promotional video and, if so, what sort of angle are you coming at it from?
Stephan Sonnenberg: I'm concerned about how all this is going to be impacting civilians. You're expanding the capability—the range—of very lethal weapons systems into situations you wouldn't currently use that kind of lethal force. It's amazing for a promotional video that the target for this is indiscriminate shelling of a village.

Yeah, putting a Middle Eastern–looking settlement in the video struck me as odd, from a PR point of view. Legally, is this idea of autonomy more cause for concern than the drone technology we see at the moment?
Human Rights Watch have taken the position of many others who think that the line should be drawn with autonomous weapons. You're abdicating ethical responsibility to some kind of a programmer to write code that's going to be consistent with humanitarian norms. I think there's a lot to be worried about.

Is there any sort of legal framework in place to differentiate between manned and unmanned flights?
The US will put forward its own justifications, many of which are classified, but if you really look at it it's very scary. For example, kids that are 12-years-old, or whatever, are going to be assumed to be targets unless posthumously proven otherwise, which is obviously outrageous.

Is there any legal framework in place to stop the US developing a fully autonomous drone?
No, I don't think there is. If I were having to argue that there was, I would come up short.

Follow Henry on Twitter.

Teachers Talk About Their Most Embarrassing Classroom Moments

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Illustrations by Alex Schubert

I still remember the first time I realized my teachers were human. I was in fifth grade—prime prank-calling age—and my friends and I had found our teacher Mrs. A's number in the phone book. Mrs. A was a creative and passionate instructor, and we'd decided to reward her for that by harassing her at home. When she picked up, my friend said we were taking a brief survey, to which that poor, polite woman replied, "Sure." After a few innocent questions, my friend went in for the kill: "And last question, do you douche?"

In the silence that followed, my cheeks flushed with embarrassment for poor Mrs. A. "I think that's a very personal question," she finally responded, still apparently unaware of the fact that a bunch of underaged imbeciles were toying with her because we didn't feel like watching Grease again. Our giggles over the hilarity of senselessly humiliating our sweet teacher became so severe that we had to hang up, but I never was able to shake the guilt I felt about that incident, nor the realization that teachers are just human beings who have been forced by their jobs to interact with adolescents.

And, like everyone, they make mistakes from time to time, only when they screw up at work it's generally in front of a pack of children who haven't learned empathy quite yet. Here are some true stories from real teachers about some of their most embarrassing moments:

"I've spilled wine on essays and tried to pass it off as grape juice. Even ninth graders knew better. In a San Francisco parochial school, I tried to pass off a hickey as a scratch from a cat. Even fifth graders knew better."
–Chris, history teacher

"Once, my class smelled so bad and I couldn't tell who did it. And it was the table farthest from the door. So I wrote 'defecation?'( in cursive so the kids couldn't read or understand it) on a pink office note. I gave it to my first suspect and sent him to the office. The note came back with a 'no' from nurse Vicky. I gave the same note to three or four kids at that table until the turd was found and we finally got relief from the smell."
–Sherry, first-grade teacher

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"I wrote the word can't on the board, but didn't close the top of the A all the way, so it said cunt and I didn't realize it. The whole class was laughing for a good ten minutes before I figured it out."
- Kathleen, English teacher

"Teaching a moderate/severe special education classroom has its fair share of surprises. Some kids don't understand the rules, and others just want to push against them. Once, while marching in line to a school assembly, a random eighth-grade girl accidentally brushed up against Billy, a student of mine, who took the opportunity to tell yell to everyone in the auditorium, 'Hey, this bitch just tried to fuck me in the ass!'

"In moments of crisis for a student with special needs, it's important to not make a big deal out of negative outbursts, because it reinforces negative attention-seeking behavior. So it was a real challenge for me to casually stroll to the front of the line and ask, 'What seems to be the problem, Billy?'

"'Uh, the problem is that this fucking bitch is all the way up my asshole.'

"Instead of admonishing him, I took a different route: 'Here's five bucks, how bout you forget about this bitch and head on over to the lunch line a little early today? No one will mess with your asshole in the cafeteria.'"
-Greg, special education teacher

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"I was doing a game in my class and the prize was a Starburst for the winning team. A sassy black girl in the class said, 'Ugh, just a Starburst?' My response to her was meant to be something along the lines of, 'Well, I can't give you a full meal,' but instead, what came out was, 'What do you want me to give you, fried chicken?' I didn't even put it together until she was like, 'Umm, what, because I'm black?' The class—me and the girl included—laughed about it, but I just responded with something like, 'No! I just meant real food!'"
–Rob, English teacher

"I begin every Wednesday morning with a song. One day, the kids were a little low-energy, so I suggested we stand and sing on the table. I guess I was envisioning some kind of grand Dead Poet's Society moment, but what happened was some kids started to dance on the tables, while others ran up and down them. I was certain there would be a cracked skull incident. It was not safe."
–Stephen, third-grade teacher

"Each year I have my juniors write a persuasive speech about any topic of their choice. I want them to chose something they care deeply about, and I told them there were no parameters on what topic they could pick. This year, I had a student write a speech persuading the administrators that there needs to be a minimum age requirement for teachers in our school."
–Jillian, a 23-year-old English teacher

Follow Tess Barker on Twitter.

Comics: Megg, Mogg, & Owl - 'Don't Shit in the Subway'

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Follow Simon Hanselmann on Twitter and look at his blog. Also buy his books from Fantagraphics and Space Face.

VICE Premiere: VICE Exclusive: Listen to Diamond Youth's Throwback Indie Rock

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Rock music is like baseball—it's been played basically the same way for a million years but it somehow manages to stay relatively interesting. You're not going to find a new guitar chord or tempo, so often the choice isn't what your band should sound like, it's who you're going to borrow from. Diamond Youth makes sounds reminiscent of 80s and 90s alt rock like the vein of Dinosaur Jr. and Failure, but their mix of angst and guitar pop doesn't feel too derivative—or maybe that genre, like a crisp double play, never really goes out of style. This track, "No Control," is from their upcoming record Nothing Matters (do these guys love the 90s or what?) out on May 19.

Preorder the new album here via Topshelf Records.


Rule Britannia: What Happens to a Family When Their Child Is Struggling with Severe Mental Illness?

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This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

Sally Burke is a mother from Hull, England. But to see her daughter—13-year-old Maisie—she is forced to make a 118-mile round trip to Sheffield, where Maisie is currently sectioned under the Mental Health Act and receiving treatment for paranoid schizophrenia.

A national shortage of hospital beds means people in crisis are being shunted all over the UK for hospital care. This, tragically, includes children. If troubled young people having to wait for two years for mental health treatment wasn't bad enough, that they can often only be admitted to psychiatric wards that are miles away from their homes and families is even more terrifying.

The figures surrounding the mental health of young Brits are alarming. The number of children being admitted to hospital for self-harm is at a five-year high. Admissions of girls ages ten to 14 have increased by 93 percent in the last four years, to 5,953, while there's been a rise of 45 percent in boys. Within this same timeframe, NHS spending on children's mental health services in England has fallen by approximately $76 million.

These have left local services in a desperate position, and the human consequence of this is felt by people like Sally and Maisie. We join the former as she makes the trek to Sheffield, its emotional toll only increased by the knowledge that just a mile away from her home is a unit that could have housed Maisie had its overnight care facility not been shut two years ago.

Maisie is a short film about what happens to a family when a child is hit by severe mental health problems and a government breaks its promises.

Click here to explore the rest of The VICE Guide to Mental Health.

New Zealand's Promising Embrace of Renewable Energy

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New Zealand is currently going through an unseasonably dry autumn, meaning the country's power-producing hydro lakes are unusually empty. This would normally be cause for concern, but the country's investment geothermal power means no one is too worried.

Broadly speaking, geothermal power refers to energy stored and extracted from the Earth's molten interior. As you might know, the planet's core sits at around 5,000 degrees Celsius. Fractures in the crust allow magma to rise towards the surface, forming volcanos and superheating ground water. Sitting over the divide between the Pacific and Australian tectonic plates, New Zealand is littered with volcanic zones and geothermal mud fields. To harness this energy, Kiwi power stations use the steam from hot groundwater to drive turbines to generate electricity. Geothermal power uses an energy source that would otherwise be wasted and, unlike other planet-friendly options such as solar and wind, it's effectiveness isn't dependent on weather patterns.

Harnessing the energy from this natural resource has a fairly lengthy history in the young country. Before the arrival of Europeans, hot springs were utilized by Maori for heating, cooking and preserving food. In more recent times, the nation's government has started looking at geothermal activity beyond its ability to pull tourists. This resource was first commercially tapped in the 1950s, but it's only in the last decade that it's really began attracting investment.

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The Wairakei Geothermal Power Plant. Image via Wiki Commons.

Over the last six years the New Zealand government has invested $2 billion in the development of geothermal plants, and they're now generating more power than gas. In the year ending in October 2014, geothermal generation accounted for 16.3 percent of total energy, compared to 15.8 percent for gas. This may seem like peanuts, but according to the Minister of Energy and Resources, Simon Bridges, the current geothermal renaissance puts the country on a path to hit the target of 90 percent renewable generation by 2025. As Bridges boasted at the Geothermal Congress this month, New Zealand is now the fifth-largest geothermal power generator in the world.

For more on the environment, watch our doc on California's worst drought in 500 years:

It's not just electricity providers that are profiting from geothermal. Several other businesses have jumped on the bandwagon, including the Maori-controlled dairy provider Miraka. The company, which opened in 2011, now transforms 250 million liters of milk into powders and UHT products annually, successfully illustrating the validity of geothermal energy for other large-scale operations.

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The Warkworth Coal Mine in Australia's Hunter Valley. This controversial mine received planning approval for an extension earlier this year. Image via Flickr user Lock the Gate Alliance.

Across the ditch in Australia, a country with more than five times the population and 28 times the land mass, the governing party seems increasingly fixated on fossil fuels. As Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced at the opening of a coal mine last year "Coal is good for humanity, coal is good for prosperity, coal is an essential part of our economic future, here in Australia, and right around the world." Tellingly, the continent has a climate policy that is set to expire in 2020.

Australia led in the field of solar energy during the 1980s, but a switch in government in the 1990s saw coal again became the country's core energy source, right up until 2012 when the Clean Energy Plan was initiated. But the 2013 election reinstalled the Liberal Party back in power and most elements of the plan were scrapped, including Australia's controversial carbon tax. As the current legislation also puts no onus on energy distributors to purchase renewable energy, the future of solar farms on the world's most solar-drenched nation remains in limbo.

And that doesn't seem likely to change. Just last month the Honorable Ian Macfarlane, Minister for Industry and Science, threatened to walk out of a negotiations meeting when the Clean Energy Council turned down the government's request to cut the Renewable Energy Target by nearly a quarter. That cut would have meant reduced targets for integrating renewable energy into Australia's power supply, which is a clear backwards step for sustainability. With the Science Portfolio rolled in with industry, it's no wonder Australia is being left in the dust in the renewables race, while New Zealand steams ahead.

Follow Danielle on Twitter.

'Celebrity Deathmatch' Is Back, So Here Are Its Greatest Ever Music Beef Bloodbaths

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'Celebrity Deathmatch' Is Back, So Here Are Its Greatest Ever Music Beef Bloodbaths

Who the Fuck Is Rollerblading in 2015?

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Photo courtesy the author

My favourite photograph of my Richmond, BC childhood doesn't actually have me in it. What it does have is my dad, my two older brothers, and three other neighbourhood boys, each dressed in weird shorts and a pair of rollerblades. The group—with my dad leading the charge—is posed in a line, each kid holding onto the hips of the person in front of him. I can easily imagine them rolling around the cul-de-sac in front of our house, smiling so hard their faces hurt. The ridiculousness of their positions was completely lost on the boys at the time, any uncertainty surrendered to childish glee; besides, it was the '90s, and rollerblading was the shit.

Today, though, it's an activity better known as a punchline, an easy jab at someone deemed unhip or just plain weird. It's an inherent uncool-ness perhaps best summed up in a sketch in the late-2000s MTV show Human Giant, which starred Aziz Ansari: "They say the hardest part of rollerblading is telling your parents you're gay," Ansari's character explains to the camera, dressed in a green sweatband, green short-shorts, and bright yellow tanktop with a hood. He just wants to "get out there on the beach" but is denied a rollerblade rental until he comes out to his parents.

It's a joke Leon Basin knows well. Basin wears his hair in a bun and owns Shop Task, a store dedicated almost entirely to rollerblades. Heading up the Vancouver location (there are also outposts in Toronto, Calgary, and Seattle), Basin is no stranger to the side-glances and curious looks from people who just don't get why he's still, of all things, rollerblading.

"I think the public is just really confused; all the public can see is what it was in the '90s with Nintendo and that whole era," explains Basin, who admits sales are slow in the winter but says he makes enough to stay in business. "When people see people skate by it's like, 'Ha ha! What is this?' In a way it's hard to get approval from your social group. You say, 'Oh, I'm going to go rollerblading.' No one is going to take you seriously."

Basin estimates most rollerbladers in Vancouver today are between the ages of 30 and 40, because blading is a good alternative to running for people who don't want that impact on their knees. The majority of Vancouver bladers do it recreationally; there are lots of couples rolling along the seawall and the odd person blading to work. Basin sees rollerbladers in 2015 as a "little tribe" of people who know you think they're odd—they just don't care.

"The people who skate are kind of over it, they don't really care [about perception]," he says. "They get whatever they get out of skating, and they really enjoy it."

Almost every week, a handful of these joyful bladers get together for a group skate in Vancouver. They usually meet at Sunset Beach and then blade along the water for a couple of hours, maybe stopping for ice cream or a drink. The group's Meetup page has nearly 350 members (and boasts "pure skating bliss!"), although usually somewhere between six and 20 show up on any given week, a mix of regulars and newbies.

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Even this kid's jump doesn't make rollerblading look cool, but he probably doesn't give a shit. Photo via Flickr user Steve Slater

"It's fun," says Jan Nekolny, one of the organizers. "Everyone's just socializing, whether it's finding out about themselves or learning and trying to pick up technique from others." Nekolny works in the public sector but in his spare time he gives rollerblading lessons to aspiring skaters. Most of his clients are adults who want to learn; he describes Vancouver bladers as a "pretty small, pretty niche community." That said, he insists his enthusiastic rollerblading hasn't been the brunt of any jokes and seems almost puzzled at the idea that people might think it's sort of lame: "I think if you know what you're doing it's totally cool."

Carley Montague agrees that if you don't know how to blade, you'll look ridiculous—"like a baby giraffe"—but that experienced skaters have serious skill. When friends ask the blonde, blue-eyed 27-year-old to go running or cycling, she agrees, with one caveat: "I say, 'I'll blade beside you,' and they burst into pure laughter." But haters be damned.

"It's just a cheap form of exercise," she says. "Living in Vancouver, everyone here promotes this active, healthy lifestyle, but yet they shun the blades. Why shun the blades?" It's a glorious, sunny day when we talk, and Montague, looking out her apartment window over at Stanley Park in the distance, feels inspired: "I'm gonna shine up those blades, get over there, and wave to all my fellow peeps." One of Montague's bladers-in-arms is Angela Dawson, better known around town as Roller Girl. The transgender woman is often spotted rollerblading around downtown in her token bright pink outfit, directing traffic or waving at passersby.

But arguably best known for putting his proverbial middle finger in the air at anyone who gives rollerblading a quizzical look is San Diego's John Kitchin. Better known as Slomo, Kitchin gave up a career in medicine in order to pursue the sense of nirvana he feels when rollerblading the boardwalk of the city's Pacific Beach. He's somewhat of a local celebrity, known for his impeccable balance, trademark bucket hat, and slow, steady speed. Kitchin preaches a do-what-makes-you-happy philosophy: "Everybody has the capacity to dream up and believe anything he wants to," he says in a 2014 New York Times documentary. "The shrinks or the psychoanalysts would call it a personal delusional system. And you believe it because you choose to." All rollerbladers, it seems, follow this creed to an extent—though perhaps leaning less on the philosophical and more on the physical, they certainly don't apologize for their chosen hobby. Why say sorry for something that brings you joy?

It's a theory echoed by Basin. "People look at us a certain way and we're like, 'whatever,'" he says. The rollerblading community in Vancouver is certainly small, but it's also determined to continue proving itself in a city full of people who are, in many respects, trying way too damn hard.

"[Rollerblading] really worked out for me," says Basin. "It can work for a lot of people if they don't care too much about being cool or not cool, or telling their parents they're gay." Really, all you have to do is grab hold of the hips of the person in front of you and roll away.

Follow Sara Harowitz on Twitter.

Meet the Godfather of Indian Pizza

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Meet the Godfather of Indian Pizza

What It's Like to Be a Straight Go-Go Dancer in a West Hollywood Gay Club

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All photos by Dieu Pham

Jeff Tetreault is a screenwriter with a produced movie to his credit— Bad Johnson, about a guy whose penis detaches from his body and turns into a personby day and a go-go boy in the Los Angeles gay bar scene by night. He dances several nights per week, rotating among the most popular West Hollywood hotspots. Every night he oils himself up, puts on tiny underwear, fluffs-up his dick, slides on his cock ring, and gets to work. There's just one catch: He's straight. And as it turns out, many of the other West Hollywood go-go boys are too. "There are easily 50 straight go-go boys that you see working regularly," Tetreault claims, a number that he estimates makes up "at least half of the total scene."

Typically, go-go boys are either swinging their dicks on stage or perched on a platform at the most eye-drawing vantage point in the room. With cash bursting out of every pelvic fold they're equipped with, they're aggressively vying for all of the eyes and dollars in the room.

Jeff sat down with me to explain the complexities, competition, hustle, and heartbreak involved in the go-go scene.

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VICE: How do you separate yourself or outdo the other go-go boys?
Jeff Tetrault: Well, I have a pretty good bulge and that's kinda my M.O. when it comes to dancing. I always want to go out with a well-fluffed dick, I want to look the best I can, have the best bulge, and I want to earn money. I don't want to be outdone by someone. I don't like when I see another dancer get more attention. I'm extremely competitive and this is why I'll never be in a male-male-female threesome, because I'd want to out-fuck the other guy.

What tips and tricks do you and the other guys use to get through the night? Cock rings? Alcohol? Adderall?
I use cock rings. Different jobs call for different pressure. If I know I'm not going to get a break for a long time I'll use something with a little looser pinch so it doesn't constrict too much. By the way, I just want to put this out there, cock rings are not magic, they don't get you hard unless you really tie the motherfucker up. Basically what they do is delay the flow of blood out of your penis, almost like an hourglass. Where as if you were just to "fluff up" and go out you'd shrink because you're not turned on, you're active, and the blood is going everywhere else. The cock ring pinches the passageway and keeps you hard for slightly longer.

I drink way too much when I dance because I don't want to go out and do a bunch of blow—that messes me up downstairs anyway—so I don't do any of that. One of the main topics of conversation I overhear in the dancing rooms when we're getting ready is what cycles the guys are on, what stacks everyone is doing. A lot of guys will take Viagra, which I don't understand because Viagra only works when you're turned on. There is a lot of coke in the background, there is a lot of K, a ton of G. I've seen one guy inject his dick with caverject, which is the stuff they use in porn to stay hard for three hours. Here he was doing it on a Wednesday night because he thought it would earn him ten extra dollars. Basically, I see the guys doing any recreational drug you can think of: weed, alcohol, and a lot of coke.

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What kind of propositions are you guys presented with while working?
Everything. I get very insulted when people like to call me a hooker, whore, prostitute, or man-whore because I don't do that stuff and I miss out on a lot of fucking money by not doing it. I routinely get offers to accompany people back home. They're called "privates," to do anything from cuddle with someone, masturbate for them, or let them blow me. The price range varies. I've been offered anywhere from $200 to $5,000, and I can't bring myself to do it.

How do you feel about being objectified when you dance?
It's part of the fun. I mean I'm not going to lie, this is the thing, I basically get to go out and party. I liken it to a Saturday or Friday night. I get paid to go out and drink and be the center of attention, rather than paying to go out and drink and trying to get people's attention.

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Have you ever felt degraded while working?
I've been condescended to many times. I'm essentially a zoo animal and a piece of meat at work. You know, people think because they have a dollar bill they have a magic wand of some sort. Since you're there for their entertainment they can treat you how they want. It's frustrating sometimes. I try to be a good sport but when you have people hanging back taking pictures and videos secretly in dark corners it is hard. This is the thing; go-go dancing is kinda like a stripping loophole. Go-go dancers aren't afforded the same protection that strippers are. In a strip club they're very up front about no photography, no touching. Since go-go dancing primarily occurs in gay bars that aren't strip clubs, security doesn't do much to enforce that stuff. It's usually the guy with the lone dollar bill that wants the most from you. The people with money don't make a big deal about making you dance for them, or treating you like a bear with a tiny hat on a ball.

Do you think perhaps you're getting a glimpse into what women are sometimes subjected to?
Definitely. I empathize with women so much more now. Men, we're pigs.

Related: Take a trip to Atlanta, the stripping capital of America.

What's the worst experience you've had while dancing?
One night I had made seven dollars in two hours and it was so demeaning and humiliating, I left early, came home, and punched a fucking hole in my door. Nobody was tipping me but everyone wanted to come up to me and squeeze my dick. It's nights like those that really make me question why I'm doing this. Most nights are pretty decent, though. People are always trying to touch me and get their hands in my underwear; I've become desensitized to it. It's more about the money than that.

Are you secretive about being a go-go? Does it interact with your personal or professional life at all?
It's not something I'm ashamed of. I see it as part of my journey. It's my job—it isn't my identity. Sometimes I play it up; sometimes I'm not too forthcoming about it. My friends use it as conversation-starter with girls. It has opened doors for me professionally. It has made me a more interesting character. I have a produced movie I wrote; I have agency representation for screenwriting. It got me my Playgirl magazine spread. I did a music video with Willam Belli and Courtney Act who are two famous drag queens. It has created an interesting narrative for myself and I feel like it's because I'm open about it.

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Do the customers know you're straight?
So much of dancing is acting; you really have to play it up. You see these guys who go to female strip clubs, you see how nice the strippers are. You've got to essentially be the stripper and talk and flirt and all of that. One of the skills of dancing is that you have to learn how to reject someone but remain endearing at the same time, which is not easy to do.

What's the farthest you've gone in terms of appeasing your customers?
God, there have been nights where I'm not making anything and you know, a dollar bill is oxygen... and sometimes it isn't about the money, you just don't want to feel like a complete piece of shit. I've had guys reach in my underwear and grab around in there, and they just leave a dollar in there and you just smile and you thank them. And I feel like such a piece of shit. Like, I basically just thanked you to grope me for a dollar. Those are the moments where I ask, "Who the fuck am I?"

This Woman Is Fighting to Legalize Toplessness in LA

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A woman walking topless on a beach. Photo via Flickr user Vox Efx

Even in stereotypically anything-goes Southern California, Venice Beach is known as a bastion of liberal ideals. It's full of street performers, colorful murals, and open marijuana use. And yet, as the Venice Neighborhood Council pointed out this week, there's one thing missing: female toplessness.

The City of Los Angeles has had a ban on female toplessness dating back to 1974 (and since Venice is a neighborhood within Los Angeles, not its own city, residents must abide by that law). It came into effect in the early 70s after groups of streakers and full-on nudists descended on Venice to hang out in the buff. The news of neighborhood's nudist communities made its way into the news, and it was then that the Los Angeles City Council decided that something must be done. They voted 12–1 to ban nudity citywide.

As of now, the law states:

No person shall appear, bathe, sunbathe, walk, change clothes, disrobe or be on any beach in such manner that the genitals, vulva, pubis, pubic symphysis, pubic hair, buttocks, natal cleft, perineum, anus, anal region or pubic hair region of any person, or any portion of the breast at or below the upper edge of the areola thereof of any female person, is exposed to public view, except in those portions of a comfort station, if any, expressly set aside for such purpose.

As a recent LA Weekly article pointed out, Los Angeles's nudity ban is actually more conservative than state law requires. (There is no federal ban on public nudity, so legality of nude or topless beaches is determined on a local level.) There are something like 50 nude or topless beaches in California; in some of these places nudity or toplessness is explicitly allowed, while in others it is tolerated though not explicitly legal.

Perhaps the most notable part of Los Angeles's law banning nudity is its explicit mention of "the areola... of any female person." Emphasis on "female." This phrasing struck Melissa Diner, a member of the Venice Neighborhood Council, as unfair. So earlier this week, at a Venice Neighborhood Council meeting, Diner proposed a change: legalize toplessness.

I spoke with Diner about why she wants to bring topless sunbathing back to Venice Beach, and how she plans to accomplish that.

VICE: What inspired you to spearhead the bill to legalize topless sunbathing for women on Venice Beach?
Melissa Diner: Other committee members and myself are constantly thinking about how we can engage people to help move all the community projects we are working on forward, including this one, but many others too. There are 95 Neighborhood Councils in Los Angeles, all that receive a budget from the city, and anyone can submit motions as an individual whether or not they sit on the council.

For the motion itself, I was inspired by Scout Willis, Demi Moore and Bruce Willis' daughter. She had done something similar to the #freethenipple and "rock the vote" campaigns. I saw her in the news supporting women's equal rights by going topless. I thought that this topic, although a serious equality issue, has the ability to start a conversation and get people involved.

What are your thoughts on the #freethenipple campaign?
I think we we are aligned on this as an equality issue, and I look forward to seeing how we can collaborate on this initiative in the future. #Freethenipple posted something on Instagram in support [of the Venice Bill]. That was really cool.

Under the current ban, if a woman is caught sunbathing topless at a beach, what penalties might she face?
I think in most cases the law, police lifeguards, etc., would not jump to penalizing instantly—rather, [they would issue] a preliminary warning. From the recent past, from what I've heard from people, there hasn't been aggressive enforcement of it. From what I hear, it's simply: "Hey, cover up."

[Note: A spokesperson for the West Los Angeles Police Department said toplessness is considered a misdemeanor, and that if a police officer witnesses the act, the perpetrator can be arrested for indecent exposure. If a police officer isn't present but a nearby person is offended by the toplessness, he or she can make a citizen's arrest—though I couldn't find any instances of citizen's arrests for toplessness in Venice Beach.]

Can you tell me a little bit about the history of nude and topless beaches in California?
As I have heard from people that were here in the 60s and 70s, nude sunbathing was allowed in Venice until the ordinance prohibiting it was put in place. [Los Angeles County Ordinance] 17.12.360 outlines the versions dating back to 1969. Others have told me that in the 80s, women were laying out topless with no one bothering them.

Related: VICE meets the topless protest group known as Femen.

Do you think the wording in the current law is sexist? Is it significant that there is something that specifies a different rule for "female persons"?
I think it's significant because it shows that it's specifically calling out only females. Maybe at the time when it was first written, they were trying to protect women. But I just think now, reading it, we should eliminate specifically calling out "female persons." Just take out that one sentence—really, only a couple words.

Do you hope that Venice Beach might eventually become clothing-optional or a full nude beach?
I try and find middle ground in order to push things forward. I definitely hear the people that say it should be all nude. Although I support them, I don't think that's something that would happen on Venice Beach, for various reason. I think you always have to start somewhere, and you start where people can all be on board. That's why I think this is the best place to start.

Besides changing the law, what do you hope to achieve?
I think this is a serious equality issue and I'm excited to pursue this further to see what we can do in order to have a say in changing this law. But it's also just something I hope will inspire people, more than anything, to come up with their own conversation starters and get involved in local politics, here in LA or across the US. If you have to put something sexy on the ballot in order to get people involved, I think that's OK. The more people that are involved, the more people we're being representative of our community as a whole, and we have the right to vote for that reason. So many people that are young are not interested in politics in any way. I think it's important to be a part of your community.

Follow Allegra Ringo on Twitter.


Show Me What Zimbabwean Democracy Looks Like

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Douglas Mwonzora and Paul Mangwana in 'Democrats' (2015), directed by Camilla Nielsson

The 14th annual Tribeca Film Festival held its award ceremony on Thursday, and Danish filmmaker Camilla Nielsson took home the grand jury prize in the World Documentary Competition for her film Democrats. A riveting look at the process through which Zimbabwe, still ruled by longtime dictator President Robert Mugabe, wrote its first constitution in the wake of a contested and corrupt 2008 "election," Democrats deftly shows the inter workings of a democracy in which intimidation and authoritarianism hang over public constitutional hearings and backroom wheeling and dealing. "Democracies in Africa are a difficult proposition, because always the opposition will want more than it deserves," Mugabe observes with a sinister smile on his face during an early portion of the film. Nielsson's documentary takes us inside the lives and tactics of the two men charged with hammering out the differences between two major Zimbabwean parties after Mugabe is forced by public outcry to produce a controlling political document for the former Rhodesia.

Paul Mangwana of Mugabe's ZANU-PF, genial and bucktoothed, does his best to seem trustworthy, trying to put a bright public face on a regime that is still known for "disappearing" people it deems disobedient. Meanwhile, his counterpart Douglas Mwonzora of Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) endures harassments and trumped-up criminal charges from the sitting government as he attempts to galvanize his more urbane, liberal supporters during years of constitutional hearings and the drafting process into something resembling representational government. The two men, inherently distrustful of one another, possess a genuine chemistry, however—one that becomes crucial when rumors circulate that Mangwana is advocating for a constitutional structure that could make him the next man to disappear or suffer a mysterious car accident.

The miracle of Nielsson's film, besides the startlingly intimate firsthand access she received from both sides in what has become a frequently bloody political feud between Mugabe's party and that of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, is that she gets these political actors to let their guards down in the midst of the historically charged series of encounters. VICE caught up with Nielsson over the phone following her film's victory for a wide-ranging conversation about the difficulties of capturing such a high-stakes series of political maneuvers, the ongoing crisis of Zimbabwean democracy, and the ways in which white privilege provided the opportunity for her to observe this black political struggle with such immediacy.

VICE: What pushed you to make this film? Has Zimbabwe been a longstanding interest of yours as a citizen?
Camilla Nielsson: The project idea came to me from a Danish journalist who lived in Zimbabwe for many years. He wanted to write a book, and then he got the idea to make a film. He pitched the idea to the production company that I was working for at the moment. And my history with making films is that I'm an anthropologist and I made films in many foreign countries. In fact I haven't made a film in my own country. So he proposed that I make the film and I thought this sounded like the most boring idea on paper, at least for a movie. A film about the constitution-making process in a dictatorship that's the most unlikely place on earth to institute a democracy while the dictator is still alive and all the anti-democratic sources were still there.

But I agreed to go on a business trip and I met first Mwonzora and then I met Mangwana. And when I met Mangwana I realized that, although I wasn't too interested in the constitution-making process itself, he was an interesting person. He had an interesting project being the guy in the middle, still sort of part of the regime, but having to push a democratic agenda that his leader didn't want. So I thought that was sort of a hot place. And when I saw the two of them together and I met the two of them, I thought, This is not going to be a film about a constitution-making process. This will be more like a party movie, a relationship film, a film about two men in a relation. How will that end? And then I thought that might be quite interesting in terms of trying to make, because it is an important subject. I've never seen a film about a constitution-making process. And I doubt that my government, if we were to rewrite our constitution, would allow me in with a camera to film those negotiations.

When I was arrested, I spoke to one of the opposition's security people to see if it was still safe to be in the country. And he said, 'Because you went around in Zimbabwe so open with a big white cameraman and a big stick and doing everything on the spot observationally, everybody knows you now. You're the only white film crew that people have seen working the way you do.'

The access seems absolutely stunning in that you had that ability to be behind closed doors in so many tense and real history-making moments.


Exactly.

I can only imagine that you found certain individuals in many of those circumstances very uncomfortable with your presence, yes?
Of course. I mean, to get the permissions to make the film, we spent about a year on the ground in Zimbabwe running between ministries trying to convince them. And the opposition was very eager to have us, but the other guys were not. But in the end, they miraculously agreed. And we signed a phonebook-thick pile of papers.

And we were, of course, very happy about that. And yet that, for us, was not even halfway through the process. I mean, we had the official permits, but the idea of making an observational film in a dictatorship where there's no free media was sort of an absurd idea in itself. It was a bit of a circus. And we had to kick doors in every day. I have to credit, also, the people. Once they understood the project that I wanted to do, that I was an anthropologist collecting the material about this circle process, telling their story. Not being a white colonial gaze, a critical journalist who just wanted to sort of tell another piece-of-shit story about their dictator. They became my ambassador and the film's ambassador. And they started opening the doors for me. In particular Mangwana, of course being part of the regime, helping me get there. I thought he was very brave to trust me and I'm really glad that he did. And our relationship is a very special one also. You know, I will admit we're very unlikely friends, the two of us, but there was something unexplainable that we had. And I think that's what it's about: It's really much more than the permits or anything else. The trust that he had in me and I had in him. And I credit him for that.

[body_image width='1920' height='930' path='images/content-images/2015/04/27/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/27/' filename='show-me-what-zimbabwean-democracy-looks-like-495-body-image-1430151153.jpg' id='50181']

Robert Mangwana in 'Democrats' (2015)

Was it difficult in your editing process to contextualize the actual political differences between the MDC and ZANU-PF? You talk about not being interested in making a movie about the constitutional process.
Well, the content of the constitution I felt was too technical for a documentary film. Like you go to the dentist and there's certain lingo and that 's why there's no material in the film about, you know, the actual content. The legal language doesn't really translate into film.

Did you feel that Mangwana was in physical danger while he was in your presence?
Oh, for sure.

And did that danger extend out to your own physical wellbeing and that of your crew?


Yes, of course. Once your call is sent in Zimbabwe, basically you're a target. I mean, what happens in Zimbabwe is that usually people either disappear. That would never happen to a man like Mangwana, the prime minister, he's the public figure. But he had a car accident, which is what usually happens in Zimbabwe when they want to get rid of people. And so in those months of filming I had tried to talk driving with him. Usually, when we moved from one location to the other, I would go in one of their cars and spend the time talking to them. They were getting interesting phone calls, something would always happen. It gave me information about what was about to happen during the day.

And then for a couple of months, I avoided driving with him at all. I was worried that something would happen. Of course everybody cared for Mangwana, we didn't want anybody to lose anyone's life. So that's why the negotiations were all moved to a secret location. That sort of pink castle-like resort that we go to, to negotiate that particular part, like 600 kilometers out of Harare—nobody knew we were there. And for us, that's when I felt this power that was really extraordinary. Me and the foreign crew were doing a mix of things telling of this negotiation. And we were basically the only ones in the world to get to see it unfold, what was going on.

Do you think there's any way that you would've been given that kind of access had you been a Zimbabwean crew or an African crew?


No, never, never, never. That debate came up many times. I mean, the people that you're talking about before didn't want them there.

Being white and European allowed for a certain kind of access that the various parties involved here were perhaps more comfortable with.


Yeah, you're right. Everybody in Zimbabwe, because of the polarized political situation, is political, either one side or the other. But we had access to both sides of the negotiating table. That fact was extraordinary because we had the point of view from both men. We filmed inside of the opposition party's headquarters. Certain political affiliations would never have been allowed into the ZANU-PF headquarters.

[body_image width='1920' height='930' path='images/content-images/2015/04/27/' crop='images/content-images-crops/2015/04/27/' filename='show-me-what-zimbabwean-democracy-looks-like-495-body-image-1430151306.jpg' id='50184']Camilla Nielsson in 'Democrats' (2015)

And I also think that a British person or an American person or people who came from a country that had a colonial history could also probably never make this film. I think our loophole besides the fact that Mangwana and I had the relationship that we had is that the Danes have quite a good reputation in Zimbabwe, because Danes are very active in supporting the liberation struggle against the Rhodesia.

Mugabe has always been very fond of the Danes and Mangwana as well. They know the stories that Danes helped them out financially. And so I heard many times—when they were trying to take me out of something or trying to limit our access—Mangwana would sort of promote our presence by saying, "No, she's Dane. She's not like from the west, not exactly like a black woman and a white woman, she's Dane." And then he would tell the stories about how the Danes were active in the liberation struggle and have been a big help in telling people, oh, all right, she's cool." And this is everything in a dictatorship. As soon as you sort of caught the ball, you were cool. Then the doors are open in a completely different way than they would be in Denmark or in the States. There I think I would have to keep pushing for access. [But in Zimbabwe] once you're in, you're in.

Mangwana said, 'Look, I went through the film, scene by scene in my head for the last two nights. I haven't been able to sleep, but my conclusion is... I think you 're telling the truth.'

One of the more fascinating aspects of the film is to watch the sort of machinery of totalitarian governance in action. I'm speaking specifically about the hearings process before the actual constitutional drafting process began, where ZANU-PF is ostensibly bussing members of their own party to places where they don 't live. And the training and almost-mind control that seems to exist in terms of their ability to get people in these rural meetings to say the same exact thing that supports Mugabe's position. Did you, in the process of making this film, encounter direct evidence of that kind of thing going on that you didn't include or that wasn't part of your narrative? Or were there other aspects of living in that kind of environment that you captured but ultimately didn't fit into the film that you made?


There were some things that we felt were too sensitive to include. Both because there were some things said in the meetings like topics that were highly critical of Mugabe. There was an instance where a pregnant woman got up and said, "This is all a sham. I mean, what is this exercise all about?" She was very critical of Mugabe and it could've been a very beautiful contribution to the film. But I felt for her safety, and I didn't want to include it. There are many things that I decided not to include. I had to censor myself a bit as the director to keep everybody safe.

Because the truth is that, when we filmed this movie, nobody thought that Mugabe would be in power when the process was over. The national momentum was that this was Mugabe's last period ruling. And so people felt that and they knew that the moment would come out as soon as the process finished. So I think it was a shock to everybody, including me, when Mugabe stole the election in 2013 and remained in power. I knew that we sat on a bomb. And I was, at some point, unsure if we could even release the film, because it is very controversial, the things that have been said. But before we released the film, we invited Mangwana and Mwonzora to Copenhagen for a week. And they saw the film and discussed the scenes and talked about the sensitive issues. And I said to them that if there were things that they felt would clearly jeopardize their safety, I think we should take it out. I didn't want to carry the ethical responsibility of their future.

And we gave them some days to think. Mwonzora was immediately approving of the movie. He said, "I've been arrested 27, 28 times, and I fear the 29th time, because of this, what I do. And I'm happy with it." Mangwana needed a few days to think and came back to me and said, "Look, I went through the film, scene by scene in my head for the last two nights. I haven't been able to sleep, but my conclusion is..." and he had a long sort of break. He didn't say anything. And I thought, Oh my God, he's going to say, 'You can't release the movie .' "I think you're telling the truth." And that's how it was.

Do you think that there's increasing disillusionment now in the wake of Mugabe's continued stronghold on power amongst people in the movement for democratic change?


You know, the funny thing is, I think their position is closer to getting in power than they ever were, because they're so few real ZANU supporters left in the country. Ten years back there were still quite a number of people who supported Mugabe who were alive when he was the liberation hero. And people would never stop looking at him as the liberation hero. I think these people are increasingly aged. And I think the younger generation is the way that can change. So I think, politically, that the support of the opposition has never been bigger. But I think they all took for granted that they would win the 2013 election. And then that didn't happen. They became so disillusioned that they started to fight amongst themselves. And suddenly some of the best and most notable politicians from the opposition were in two different camps.

So Mugabe had a perfect divide-and-rule situation from that election. And I'd say that the shock of having lost the election, because this was not the first election that Mangwana lost to Mugabe, you know, unfairly. I think it was the third or the fourth, maybe, that he lost unfairly. And I think there's a limit to how much you can take as an individual. I think it was a total bomb and a total shock. And they were paralyzed for months. And now they're in two [groups], and there's no united opposition. Without a united opposition, Mugabe has an easy place. So I don't think anybody can speculate what happens in Zimbabwe in the coming years. I think anybody who does, doesn't know very much about Zimbabwe.

The other question is whether a guy like Mangwana after three or four presidential election losses has the stamina to do a fifth one. I mean, is he really the right candidate? I wonder about this. I would have a hope that someone like Mwonzora would be able to run. I think he would make an excellent president.

Mwonzora's been been accused 28 times. He's been acquitted each time. He is now the most arrested politician in Zimbabwean political history.

How do you think that will affect their own standing in Zimbabwean politics, now that the film is part of the public record?


I think obviously Mwonzora is the one who is going to benefit most politically from this film. Although I have to say that, you know, when audiences have seen this film, their immediate emotional response is always when they get to Mangwana. Like many people, they have a new hero today: His name is Mangwana. The response to his character in his situation is much stronger from audiences who see the film outside of Zimbabwe. In Zimbabwe, he will be seen as an even bigger traitor. But I think he will also benefit, because a lot of people in Zimbabwe do not like Mugabe anymore. And Mangwana's been such a brave pioneer who has been sort of pushing a progressive agenda before anyone else. So I think over time, historically, down the line, Mangwana will be remembered. He will have a legacy as a guy who sort of took off the uniform before anyone else.

You get me? And I think his place in history will be ensured by this film, and I think he knows that. But until Mugabe's gone, there will be a period where he will be seen as what they already think, as a traitor. His situation was that when he finished writing the constitution, he wasn't even elected to parliament—in the next election there were both the parliament and the presidential election. And his own party put another candidate in his constituency and bankrolled him with a lot of money. And basically Mangwana lost the primary election in his own constituency. Although he's hugely popular, he was less hugely popular than the other candidate. And that was their way of giving him the boot.

Mwonzora had sort of the opposite journey after the constitution process. He was the spokesperson for the MDC for the democratic change. He's now the secretary general of the parliament. So he's second in line after Tsvangirai. And that leads you to think his ambition is on another level. That's all I would say.

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Douglas Mwonzora in 'Democrats' (2015)

What became of the criminal charges against him that happened, you know, late in the film? They aren't ever resolved before the film ends, correct?


No, they're not. They put them on hold so that the constitution can be restored. Actually, not more than two or three weeks ago, he was finally acquitted again of those claims. He's been accused 28 times, he's been acquitted each time. And they have nothing on him. But it takes his time; it distracts his focus. He is now the most arrested politician in Zimbabwean political history. That also for me is a signifier of his relevance, of his power, of his potential. That the regime spends so much time keeping him passive or inactive. I want to talk for him on this matter, because in Zimbabwe there is no "me" culture.

You know, you don't brag. It's very subtle. And if you say that you want to be the president then you will never be a president. So it's sort of troubling. I think he has that aspiration. In fact, we made the agreement that if he runs for the big office, I'll make part two of this film. I thought that would be a good follow-up given the history he had.

We set up a monitor in the local café and invited all the notorieties, all the ambassadors, the donors, the characters in the film, their families, the state, the private media. Even the secret police were there. And on February 6, we had a public screening of this film inside Harare, something completely unheard of.

You talked about the way in which normal citizens can be disappeared by ZANU-PF. And yet for these two men that kind of political violence is unimaginable.


Not for them, no. They're public figures. I spoke to a lot of people besides Mangwana and Mwonzora about issues related to their safety. And the one answer that I hadn't thought of myself, but which was repeated all the time including by Mangwana and Mwonzora themselves, is that this film in fact gives them protection through the publicity. I mean, this film is now all over the world. And if something happens to them, it's very obvious who did it and why. And I think that they are right.

I can tell you a similar example. We were often worried about our safety. We were being followed; I was arrested when I was there; they hacked my phone. It was quite an intense filming environment. And, of course, we were almost beaten up a couple of times. When I was arrested, I spoke to one of the opposition's security people to sort of see if it was still safe to be in the country. And he said, "Because you went around in Zimbabwe so open with a big white cameraman and a big stick and doing everything on the spot observationally, everybody knows you now. You're the only white film crew that people have seen working the way you do."

I can tell you an anecdote. If we got to a press conference and the state press were there, they would just film us. They wouldn't film the press conference. The story would be that there had been two white people at the press conference talking about what the press conference was about. And they said the same thing to us. "You are now so public in Zimbabwe, it's going to be very hard to target you. And you are open about how you are making this project. If you had done this undercover with a small camera in secret, you may not have even gotten in and gotten to shoot anything that could have been a scenario."

Lastly, do you think you 'll get to show the film in Zimbabwe?


We have shown the film in Zimbabwe.

You did. And what was the response? And what kind of audience was it?
We've shown it one time because for me it was important that it was shown locally before we started this whole sort of international festival tour. And because I was arrested on my final trip to Zimbabwe, I can't reenter the country. But we have a very brave Danish ambassador in Zimbabwe who suggested that he then host a screening. So we set up a monitor in the local café and invited all the notorieties, all the ambassadors, the donors, the characters in the film, their families, the state, the private media. Even the secret police were there. And on February 6, we had a public screening of this film inside Harare, something completely unheard of. We were expecting them to come and shut it down. But I think the strategic choice was sort of invite so many people of this kind that if they wanted to shut down the screening, they would have had to do it in front of all the donors who are basically keeping the economy going.

So they didn't. And I wasn't there. But I've been in some panels with Zimbabwean human-rights activists who've been joining me on this festival circuit. And they were there. And they talk about it as one of the most magic moments they remember. Like the fact that it was packed, standing room only, 400 people from both sides of the political divide came into that room, sat down together, had a glass of wine, watched a movie, stayed after, had a conversation, and left peacefully.

Of course we want the rest of the nation to see it also. But we were just kind of testing the waters. And the regime hasn't reacted to the film at all in its final treatment. So, so far, so good.


If you could ask Robert Mugabe one question, what would it be?
Wow. That's a very good question and I never thought about this. What would I ask him? I couldn't tell you. I will have to think very carefully about what I say, because for a long time I didn't even use the D-word with his name. Now it's all over the place. You know, it is a very sensitive thing. I was at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival in London three weeks ago and when I arrived, there were three security guys to look after me. I don't know exactly what the incident was, but there's been some kind of a threat. There are a ton of people in London and in South Africa who are very, very fanatic supporters of Mugabe. So I'm still watching my words a little bit. Just sort of testing the waters in terms of how this response to this film is going to be from the regime. But there's been none so far. And I think they're wise in doing that. I think the worst thing they can do is attack the film.

Brandon Harris is a contributing editor at Filmmaker Magazine. His directorial debutRedlegs has played over a dozen festivals worldwide and was a New York Times critic's pick upon its commercial release in May of 2012. Follow him on Twitter.

When the DEA Went to Burning Man, Shit Got [Redacted]

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When the DEA Went to Burning Man, Shit Got [Redacted]

Meet the 16-Year-Old Producer Igniting Lisbon's Underground

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Meet the 16-Year-Old Producer Igniting Lisbon's Underground

Burying the Dead in Alaska Is More Complicated Than You'd Think

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Bob Ferrell in his office. Photo by the author

Living in Alaska can be a lot like dying in Alaska. Both have the makings of a good story, the difference being whether you're the one telling it or not. If you're telling it, then one of two things is possible: Either you survived or you were never in danger. If you're not telling it, you're probably dead. And if you're dead, chances are you're dealing with Bob Ferrell.

"This is your favorite undertaker," Bob Ferrell says from across the table. He's a short, squat guy with a smile that seems out of place in a funeral home. "That's what I say when I call my friends."

Alaska is a melting pot for the entire world. There's a large Korean community, Polish community, Russian community, Filipino community, and Samoan community, among others. And when those people move here, they bring their experiences and their customs, in life and in death, with them.

"One day we may be handling a Korean family's funeral. The next day maybe we're handling someone who was visiting from Michigan," Bob tells me. "If you're not flexible, not willing to do what the people want, then you're not going to make it."

That's the job of the Undertaker: to fulfill the family's wishes, so that they can properly grieve. Because in this business, you're not really dealing with the dead. You're dealing with the family, the friends, and the loved ones left behind. "If the family is heading down the wrong road, where somewhere down the line they are going to have to see a psychiatrist, I will intervene and say, 'I don't think we should do this, and this is the reason why,'" Bob tells me. A bad grieving experience can cause serious, long-term emotional damage. Which is why Bob agreed to embalm his friend's dad in a sitting position and posture his body on top of his favorite recliner for the viewing ceremony.

"[His family] brought his recliner from home, his side table, his lamp, and his TV, and we set it all up," Bob says. "We dressed him in his normal clothing and put his glasses on. On Sundays, the grandkids would sit next to his chair and visit with him while he sat with his word puzzles. He'd be sleeping in his chair with his puzzle book and pen in his hand. So, that's how we got him set up. When the grandkids came into the ceremony for the first time, they just came into a room and there was grandpa in grandpa's chair and everything was cool. They went up, said goodbye to grandpa and they weren't afraid. The kids had a good grieving experience. My friend and his wife had a good grieving experience."

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Photo by the author.

Prior to World War II, an undertaker's job looked a lot different. Ceremonies were practically identical. They began with a visitation the evening before the service—family and friends gathered at a location (a house or funeral home) to express sympathy for the deceased. The service was held the following day at a church. Then, after the service, everyone went to the cemetery to give their final goodbyes. "It didn't matter if you were Episcopal, Catholic, Lutheran, or Baptist, it was all pretty much the same thing," Bob says. All that uniformity went out the window with the Baby Boomers. How we speak about and remember the dead began to take precedence over shoving bodies in the ground and being done with it. Nowadays, for instance, "sharing" has become a common practice at funerals—people in attendance share memories of the deceased.

Bob grew up in the 50s in Snohomish, Washington ("Warshington," he says with a hard R), a small town known for its antiques. By the time he was 15, he was working at a funeral home, washing cars, mowing lawns, and hosing off driveways. He had no intention of becoming an undertaker, not yet at least, he just needed money. Then again, he had no intention of moving to Alaska, either. That is, until he was 26, fresh out of mortuary school, and five years into his first marriage.

"Our families were interfering with our marriage. We wanted to get as far away as possible, so we flipped a coin: Heads, we're going to Alaska. Tails, we're going to Florida," Bob tells me. "I'm not sure if it made sense, but that's what we did."

Related: Death in a Can

Alaska isn't known for its easy way of life, but it presents a set of especially unique challenges to undertakers. Because of the extremely low temperatures, there are only about four months out of the year during which it's possible to bury a body. For the other eight, the ground is frozen solid. So bodies that aren't cremated need to be kept in winter storage. These storage facilities—kept at freezing temperatures for obvious reasons—range from converted garages, like the one at Angelus Memorial in Anchorage, to a couple morgue coolers like the ones at Elmendorf Air Force Base. With a storage capacity of 80 bodies, the Angelus Memorial facility is the largest one in the state.

"Anything that you can think of, I've probably buried it."—Bob Ferrell

"[The Angelus Memorial facility] is made out of two-by-fours and plywood. Inside, it's kind of tiered. You have like four tiers of cribs and you just slide the casket in and that's where it stays. [It's] like a little cubbyhole," Bob tells me. "Come springtime, we take them out for burial."

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The Angelus Memorial Winter Storage Facility. Photo by the author.

Bob has been burying the dead for 42 years. "Anything that you can think of, I've probably buried it," he says with a certain even-toned inflection that seems to convey a mixture of callousness and empathy, if there is such a thing. Thirty of those years have been spent burying the dead in Alaska. Victims of ATV accidents, snowmobile accidents, fishing accidents, mining accidents, airplane accidents, moose attacks, bear maulings, exposure—"a person traveling from one village to another in the dead of winter, their snowmobile may fall through the ice, they get wet, get out, curl up next to a tree, and they die. Almost anything you can think of we deal with. We get a lot of difficult cases that you would seldom see down in the Lower 48. I think the first bear mauling that I handled up here, in the early 80s, it just kind of took me aback because I hadn't been around that. Like what the bear would eat off the human and stuff like that."

By any standard, this is a difficult profession. Bob's personal life is evidence of that. "I'm on marriage number three if that tells you anything," he says with a shrug. If you get a call at 2 AM, it's not a job where you can prescribe two aspirin and have your patient call you in the morning. "When you've had a tragedy in your family, you need it taken care of now. I have missed, I can't tell you how many holidays, dinners, school plays, and birthdays because I've had to take care of someone else's family."

In the end, everyone goes back to their roots. A church, a synagogue, a mosque, home, wherever our foundation was laid, that's where we find our final comfort and solace. Because we're all creatures of habit who return to that familiar place from whence we came.

Cody Liska lives in Alaska and runs Crude Magazine.

Post Mortem: These Radical Undertakers Want Funerals to Be More Honest and Participatory

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Rupert and Claire Callender

Claire and Rupert Callender have always done things a little differently. The pair made their foray into the funeral business in 2000 when they launched the Green Funeral Company in the United Kingdom, which was designed "to offer an ecological alternative to traditional funerals." Since then, the company has evolved to include much more than just ecological concerns. The Callenders want funerals to be honest, meaningful, full-participation affairs—an approach they call "radical undertaking."

I was curious about what "radical undertaking" might entail, so I spoke to the couple via Skype about the way their approach differs from more "traditional" funeral services, how they get people to become active participants in burials, and their fight to bring back funeral pyres.

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VICE: You've referred to yourselves as self-taught radical undertakers. I get the self-taught part, but what do you mean by "radical"?
Rupert Callender: In the UK, you don't need a license to become a funeral director. There's two of us—we have now taken on someone else [for administrative work], but it's basically just us. So not the conventional model of having a big shiny hearse and a load of vehicles and a load of people, some of whose job it will be to answer the phone and some whose job it will be to go and collect the body, someone whose job will be to dress up in the pomp and all of that. We do all of that, including taking the ceremony for the person who's died if they are non-religious, which in this country is most of us.

Claire Callender: We don't even have a hearse. We have a 20-year-old Volvo. We don't have six creepy blokes carrying your mum to her grave. We get you and your friends and your brothers and sisters to carry her and lower her into her grave. That's radical in this country—weirdly.

To the extent that such a thing applies, what would a "typical" service look like with you?
Claire: They are all kind of different, but they all have a similar framework. Basically, a good funeral for me is you've got the person who's died in their coffin and then standing around them for one last time you've got people what that person meant something to. The family that loves them, their friends, whatever. And we are all standing, encircling their body for one last time on this earth, talking about them with honesty. So Rupert might open it and stand up and talk. If poetry means something to them, then somebody might say some poetry. We've done funerals near rivers, on beaches, in woods, in football clubs, in rugby clubs, in pubs, in village halls, in sitting rooms, in people's gardens. We do them all over the place.

Rupert: We buried a homeless guy who died in our streets here in a very public funeral in the middle of town, carried him up the high street.

Claire: Where 100 people from the town turned up. He froze to death on the streets in our little town. We have a high street that goes up a hill, and the town carried him up with different people taking over at different times, and then we go and lower them into their grave.

"If you get it wrong at a funeral, the consequences are enormous. So we're kind of treading a tightrope."

Would it be fair to say that you're encouraging people to be more than attendees at funerals, and to be participants?
Rupert: We do try to get people involved, you're absolutely right. The worst-case scenario is you are just an audience watching this thing unfold in front of you. And then some people also find it excruciating if you're going to make them do something out of their cultural norm. Like if you're an 80-year-old Catholic woman you don't want to stand with a talking stick and share your heart.

Claire: So we don't make them.

Rupert: What we do is we involve them by making them listen, right from the start. Too often you go to a funeral and whoever takes the service kind of stands up and [says] just a few words. The family afterwards asks you all to come back here and it's like housekeeping. So we don't do that here. We go in really quite hard and talk about first death and what that means. Then we talk about how the person died because that is often so absent from ceremonies.

Claire: The manner of death. Starting with their actual dying.

Rupert: And then we start to talk about the reality of who this person was and and so even if you're not actually physically participating in what you're doing, we've got your attention. You are like, Oh my God, someone is describing their last moments. We're describing their horrendous last six months or that blissful death or talking about their alcoholism or their tendencies to do this and that. And that that is a way of getting people to participate because you just bring them into the present. They're really there.

You also ask people to participate physically, right?
The coffins we use have six load-bearing handles, so everyone can use it. We've had 90-year-old grannies and nine-year-old great-great-granddaughters carrying coffins.

Claire: That's a really useful device for getting people out there [participating], because you can be absent easily in this kind of situation. It gets them out of their heads and into their body by doing a heavy physical act. Brings you into the present and into the moment. Sometimes you have to carry them up a hill [with] some burial grounds. It's quite hard work.

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Do you ever worry about people not being emotionally prepared to participate to such an extent?
Rupert: You know, it's very edgy work there because you're dealing with people who are very vulnerable. If you get it wrong at a funeral, the consequences are enormous. So every time we take this path we're treading a real tightrope. The ideal experience we want to give the family is we want to show them that they have shown us an aspect of their relationship with the dead person that they didn't realize they've shown us. That's why we slow it down. We feel into it and it might be five days down the line where they suddenly kind of mention that there was an alcoholic father or grandfather and you just go, "OK, now I'm starting to get a flavor of who this person is," and then we bring it. And everyone is a little bit astonished. They're so used to going to these these funerals where the person who's died is just this amazing character. When you bring up what they're really like, there's a release of tension in the room and there's a possibility for healing.

It sounds like you get pretty emotionally involved with each burial as well.
Rupert: We do. I hate to say, "We go on a journey with the family," but we do kind of accompany them. We do get very involved with them to the point where a lot of our best friends are now people we met through burying their dad or their mum. And we process it differently. So we cry a lot, we dance a lot. We kind of consciously do rituals to move it through.

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I understand you are trying to bring back funeral pyres?
Rupert: We are involved in a campaign to try and re-legalize outdoor pyres, because that's how cremation started in this country. There was a guy [fighting for it] called Dr. [William] Price—a Welsh druid in the late 1800s. When it was legalized and he died, his cremation was on the top of a hill in front of 20,000 people. This incredibly theatrical event which is now being reduced to this incredibly undemonstrative, untheatrical, unmoving, bureaucratic process completely divorced from the fire.

In the UK, I'm guessing there are laws against similar burial practices today?
Rupert: It has gone to the High Court. And the word is that if you did a one-off funeral pyre in one place and it's for family, and you've done the right paperwork for cremation, it's unlikely you'd get prosecuted. It's more if you started to do another one in the same place then technically that would become a crematorium. There's all sorts of opposition to it, largely from the funeral establishment and the people who run crematoriums who make a hell of a lot of money out of it. I mean, the cost of the fuel to burn someone is twopence, and they charge not far off $1,500 for that 20-minute service. The returns are huge, so the crematorium establishment and the funeral establishment have a stake in not letting funeral pyres happen.

What is the biggest misconception about your profession?
Claire: People think it's depressing being an undertaker, and I just want to say it's the exact opposite. It's just the best job because you make really great connections with people. We come into their lives really intensely for two to three weeks and there's no bullshit. Bullshit is the first casualty of death and it's gone, it's out of the room and I love that. The faith that it gives you in your fellow humans is amazing. And that every single one of us—really normal, everyday people—you know when the worst thing happens, when your teenage kid leaves and doesn't come back, every single one of us has this amazing core of strength and light that we can draw on that you know that gets us through this and it's amazing to be around that. And people are great. You see your community at it's best when someone dies and everyone's there leaving a casserole on the doorstep, they're doing the shopping, they're bringing cakes. You see the community rise up and and support his family. So being around that day to day is very life affirming.

Follow Simon Davis on Twitter.

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