This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

My best experiences with art haven't come while deliberating, brow furrowed, over potential meanings or interpretations. They've arrived instead when I've let go of cognition—when the art has belied analysis, and simply cascaded over me. I love that feeling of being overwhelmed. But often, in video games, it's conflated with explosions and spectacle.

"Whoosh!" goes Call of Duty. "Bang!" goes Destiny. "Argh!" goes The Last of Us. And this so-called excitement and wow factor, the things games are supposed to do well, rapidly gets old. No matter how grand the action or how refined the graphics and sound, it's hard to be overwhelmed when you can anticipate each beat.

That's why I adore Killer7. I know interpretations exist, and there are essays about how it reflects Japan, America, politics, and history. But for me, Killer7 is raw energy. It's just there—it's instant. With blood, swearing, violence, and absurdity, Killer7 washes me away, and in doing so ascends to a level of extravaganza reached by few other games.

It's still spectacle—it's still shock, noise, and color—but instead of an explosion, a blood spray, or a zombie, Killer7 gives you a talking head in a tumble drier, a boss fight with a pigeon, a spectral gimp attached to the ceiling. And it doesn't ever question or roll its eyes at what's going on—Killer7 throws completely in with itself, and in doing so deftly avoids self-parody.

Coming out in the UK and US in July 2005 (and a month earlier in Japan), when boxed video game releases were declining towards uniformity, it was a final gasp of fresh air. Now, in 2015, Killer7 is an example of what Big Gaming ought to be. Published by the giant Capcom and overseen by Resident Evil series creator Shinji Mikami as part of the "Capcom Five," it advocates a kind of synergy, where the profits from stone-cold franchises are in part used to finance stranger ideas. Ubisoft tried this with Valiant Hearts and Starbreeze did it with Brothers. Those results were mixed, but what a better way to work. Killer7 is what comes when individuality and corporate production value somehow successfully entwine.

It's also the last decent game by Goichi Suda, aka Suda51. I don't know what happened, but after Killer7 the designer, director, and CEO of Grasshopper Manufacture collapsed into Shadows of the Damned, Lollipop Chainsaw, and Killer is Dead—dumb, gratuitous, sexist shit, providing for Killer7 what Francis Coppola's Jack did for The Godfather. I have no love for Suda51—it's not like his games, post 2005, somehow broke my heart. But they make Killer7 an even greater curiosity. It's like that brilliant first novel from a writer who's not only pregnant with ideas but capable of getting them out in a coherent, intelligent single-shot. I get the sense that whatever Suda had to give, he gave it in Killer7. It's a striking, bold outpouring of consciousness—it's a real rush. But everything afterwards feels either wraparound or like emulation.

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His ideas about sex changed, I think. In those latter games, sex is used for slapstick and titillation. You have Gabriel Hotspur in Shadow of the Damned firing a cannon from between his legs and shouting, "Taste my big boner!" Then there's the "gigolo mode" in Killer is Dead, where you ogle women for points, and Juliet in Lollipop Chainsaw, the worst kind of puerile, cheap, gaming wet dream. The representations of sex in Suda51's later games were anything but sophisticated.

In Killer7, though, sex was uneasy, bleak. The aforementioned talking head in the tumble drier, named Susie, relays the story of her first boyfriend, and how he tried to grab her one night. The relationship between patriarch Harman Smith and his assistant, Samantha, has hints of dominant/submissive play. And then there's Curtis Blackburn, the grotesque rapist, murderer, and organ trafficker who dresses his accomplice up like an animé girl and has a fetish for turning people into mannequins. From Susie's tale, to Blackburn's evil, to Harman eye-balling Samantha in her uniform, Killer7 casts a condemning eye at men and male objectification of women.

As I've said, I'm reticent to allocate it a concrete meaning, because what I love about Killer7, especially today, is its raw, sensory power. But it observes an ugliness on the behalf of men's sexual desires. Suda's later games were sex shot from a non-ironic, unquestioningly sexist perspective. Killer7 provided also a sexist view of the world, but contextualized it as gross and unreliable. It's telling that Killer7's story—if you want to reduce the game down to something narrative—is about two male gods, arguing the toss ad infinitum over who's the most powerful. It's a game about men's petulant and destructive desire to take what they like and make themselves heard.

Helped by Masafumi Takada's terrific soundtrack, Killer 7's environments—perhaps the most impressive of any mainstream game of the past decade—evoke queasiness, discomfort, amazement, and comedy. The game seems to have no objective or agenda. Like the characters themselves, who move between places, timelines, identities, and consciousnesses, Killer7 is loose, purposeless, unbound by expectation. Rather than tracking or predicting it, moment to moment, it's a game you stare into.

A trailer for 'Killer7.'

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The white noise on Harman's TV screen. The bizarre dance of a Heaven Smile, the game's cannon fodder. Travis the ghost, hanging from a tree, wearing a tank top that says "GOOD SHAPE." Killer7 is popping with images that aren't just strange, but magnetic, stimulating. It's the closest video games have got to relinquishing what Salvador Dali called "aesthetic concern." It just is. It just overwhelms. It's something that my eyes simply like and crave.

"We're in a tight spot," repeats Iwazaru, the aforementioned gimp from the ceiling. And in 2015, with games being what they are, he couldn't be more right. Pure expression is what we need in the mainstream. Of that, Killer7 remains a powerful example.

Follow Ed Smith on Twitter.

A sign at this weekend's London Pride. Photos by the author

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

Last Friday, as on some Friday nights at the pub, I found myself surrounded by a congregation I don't really feel part of. But it's Ramadan, I needed somewhere to pray, and I was bored of frying my own samosas, having had nil by mouth for nearly 18 hours. The truth is—my love of samosas aside—I, like many other queer Muslims, have always struggled to find commonalities with the Ummah.

I remember being told at the mosque when I was 14 that Christmas trees were evil and that if we were ever to get one we would all burn in hell. I'm not joking. So imagine my abject horror at seeing one at school and wondering what I would need to do to repent. Luckily I grew up in a forward-thinking Western society, and my friends reassured me that the fake pine tree on a plastic stand was unlikely to cause an eternity in hellfire. Short episodes like these plagued my upbringing, but I found a way to navigate the path of being a Muslim brought up in a secular democracy. And today, I am one of those so-called "British Muslims."

Getting here wasn't easy. I spent a long time growing up trying to combine the words "British" and "Muslim." The British part was easy. I was born and brought up in London, so, for all intents and purpose, I am British. It's the Muslim part that's a quandary, mostly because everyone seems to have a different opinion of what it means. If the mainstream press is to be believed, it means a follower of Islam, a dangerous faith that leads to terrorism. David Cameron's recent speech in Slovakia reaffirmed that view.

Just as I came to terms with what it meant to be a British Muslim in my teens, I'm now navigating a third layer of my identity in my 20s—"gay." I've never had trouble with words being fused together. I was once affectionately nicknamed a "Skindian"—literally, "skinny Indian" (particularly apt during Ramadan)—and the term "Gaysian" has done the rounds for years now. However, there was something unsettling about putting the words "gay" and "Muslim" together; not just because they don't form a convenient portmanteau, but because I couldn't find anywhere where they happily coexist.

Perhaps I needed to consult a religious scholar for some advice about being gay. Error—he'll just tell me I'm going to hell. First the Christmas tree, now this. Any Muslim with questions about reconciling their faith, their sexuality, or even their Christmas shopping faces an uphill jihad. The Qu'ran is the the Book. The roughly 1,400-year-old Chicken Soup for the Soul for followers of Allah and the Prophet Muhammad. Read it, heed its words; that's your recipe for how to live life. So said the imams and those around me growing up. Leave your critical thought (and your shoes) at the front door and enter the Muslim world ready to be told what to do.

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I asked Zia Chaudhry MBE, author of Just Your Average Muslim, why critical thinking seems to be discouraged. He told me: "We're going through a rediscovery of Islam, and that's an uncomfortable place to be. Islam used to be flexible and the Qu'ran was a source of guidance that was left to interpretation. Today, however, rigidity has set in."

This rigidity is having far-reaching consequences; in a recent article for the Guardian, Chaudhry argues that to reduce chances of radicalization, children need a "space to discover the inherent spirituality of Islam that seems conspicuous by its absence in the modern world."

When I came out, I struggled to find the space Chaudhry mentions, and I knew that some choose a more dramatic path. For many, it's a choice: Islam or homosexuality. To quote Ghulam Rasool of Leicester central mosque: "To have the inclination has never been condemned. It's acting upon it."

To find out if this belief is universal, I decided to march at Pride for the first time this year. I took part with Imaan, an LGBTQI support group that has taken to the Pride parade for many years. Its members showed me that gay and Muslim can co-exist, not just in vocabulary but also in practice. I met Muslims of every form, from converts and partners to scholars, all of whom are forming a new narrative of what it means to be gay and a believer in Islam.

Shanon Shah, a sociologist of religion whose doctoral research focused on Islam and sexuality in Malaysia and Britain, told me about Imaan's work in helping gay Muslims. A large part of it starts by building intra-Muslim bridges and a dialogue within a community notorious for skirting around important matters of gender and sexuality.

Watch our film Gay Conversion Therapy, about a bunch of misguided souls who actually believe you can "cure" gayness:

In 2012, Imaan hosted an international conference that included a panel of Muslim organizations from across the country discussing modern-day Islam. One panelist, Yahya Birt of the City Circle, opened his contribution by saying: "The Muslim organizations have failed people like you in this room [ie LGBTQI Muslims] for such a long time, and for that I am truly sorry."

It was clear from my conversation with Shanon that to be gay and Muslim means pushing for acceptance and understanding within our own community. One by-product of this is the chant: "Two, four, six, eight, is that imam really straight?"

Armed with this placard on Saturday, I wanted to gauge whether the world is ready for Muslims to define themselves in a way that isn't displayed on the front page of the Daily Mail. From the woman who shouted, "Yes! Just brilliant!" at me as we passed her, to Carrie Bishop's tweet about another one of our chants, I started to get a sense that there are many people who will welcome a more nuanced version of Islam; one that is balanced and more carefully thought through.

Could it be, then, that being gay and Muslim is about to experience a Milifandom moment? Let's not get ahead of ourselves. But if the popularity of #wearenotharam is anything to go by, it's clear that there are more and more LGBTQI Muslims with the courage to speak up. Scrolling through the hashtag led me to Coming Out Muslim: Radical Acts of Love, a storytelling performance that's been gaining momentum in the United States.

I asked Terna, a performer of Coming Out Muslim, about who she usually sees in the audience. "There are a few groups: the queer community, queer Muslims, straight Muslims and people from religious backgrounds. We get a lot of, 'Oh, I had no idea you existed,' coming from all angles," she said.

For Terna, it's as much about carving out a space for Muslims to be gay as it is for LGBTQ people of faith. "LGBTQ culture is often associated with drinking and excess partying, which doesn't always fit with observant Muslims," she said. "That's a tension. We're offering alternatives of what it means to be queer."

It's easy to get caught up in the jubilation of the recent legalization of same-sex marriage in the US, a Pride march, and those new colorful Facebook profile photos; equally, it goes without saying that a lot of work in majority Islamic states remains, and there are dark corners of the internet that will be slower to progress. But with an intellectual narrative, we're starting to see more individuals and organizations address a new view of Islam and form a new space for critical thought. In 2015, this new view will be forced to engage with matters of LGBTQ identity. Whether it's a closed Facebook group or outlets such as the Everyday Muslim blog, safe spaces are appearing that move Islam forward.

That gives me real faith that, one day, more people will start to accept they can be gay and Muslim, not gay or Muslim.

An example of Tel Aviv's Bauhaus architecture. Photo via Flickr

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

On the 49th floor of one of Tel Aviv's tallest buildings—the Azriel Center—there's a viewing platform that gives tourists and locals a panoramic look at the city beneath. The scene—as with any big city—is diverse. You can see grays, whites, and reds, low-rise apartments and corporate megastructures, all swallowed up eventually by the blue hue of the Mediterranean.

The first time I visited Tel Aviv as a teenager, I remember climbing up to the circular tower observatory and hearing about the city from the guides I was with. They told us we were looking at some kind of architectural marvel built on the sand dunes of the Jewish homeland. They called it the "White City" after its chalky modernist architecture, and I took it more or less as gospel. The reds and grays slowly slid out of my memory, and the high-rise glass towers faded into an urban landscape of clean straight lines and neat curves.

It was the same image of Tel Aviv that everyone gets told and everyone tends to believe. Back in 2003 the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) declared Tel Aviv a world heritage site for the 4,000 odd buildings that make up this so-called "White City"—a collection of modernist Bauhaus-influenced buildings that sprung up in the 1930s and have come to define the city.

It's an easy enough story to buy into. Walk around the center of Tel Aviv—through the low-rise, off-white apartments, hip cafes, and decent clubs, and you quickly forget you're in the middle of one of the world's more intractable crises. There's an equanimity to the place that you don't find in other parts of the country. But how accurate is the story?

On a mild afternoon, a few days before the recent Israeli elections, I sat down at a small cafe in South Tel Aviv with Sharon Rotbard, the dissident Israeli architect whose book White City, Black City: Architecture and War in Tel Aviv and Jaffa, was just published in English. The book tells the story left out by the clean, cosmopolitan, and virtuous history I was familiar with.

Sharon Rotbard

For starters, Rotbard says, Tel Aviv isn't white—it's a pale, dirty monochrome. Its famous Bauhaus buildings are, he claims, just one of many architectural styles present in the city. Of those that do conform to it, almost none were built by architects associated with the school. None possess any of the social utopianism you might expect from that movement.

"It's completely fictitious, but it made for a good story," Rotbard, who teaches architecture at Jerusalem's Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design told me. "I was a student in the 1980s, and I saw with my own eyes how the narrative formed. The urban legend of Tel Aviv described the city as the realization of the European modernist avant-garde. But most architecture in the 30s was petit-bourgeois building made for wealthy people. And there were only four Bauhaus training architects active in Palestine."

It's easier to understand why this narrative formed when you look at what it leaves out. The Shapira neighborhood, where we met, forms part of what Rotbard describes as the "Black City"—the areas, he tells me, "overshadowed by the White City, the places that can't make it into Tel Aviv's history." Shapira lies on the periphery of Jaffa, the Palestinian city Tel Aviv grew out of and eventually engulfed. And it's here where the story of the White City becomes darker and darker.

Before the establishment of the State of Israel was declared in 1948, Jaffa was part of the cultural and economic heart of Palestine. Known as the Bride of the Sea, its port bustled with life and its orchards and vineyards defined the landscape of the city.

But things started to change as new immigrants arrived. New Jewish neighborhoods sprung up around the city, cutting Jaffa off from the rest of the country and turning a thriving city into an isolated enclave.

Shortly after the UN partition plan in 1947, Zionist militias led by the Irgun and Stern Gang began attacking Jaffa's largely civilian population. In the months that followed, tens of thousands of Palestinians were forced to flee, many through the only possible way: the sea. The city's municipal services and businesses quickly collapsed and the tiny fraction of its remaining citizens were placed under strict martial law. Over the decades that followed, much of the area was bulldozed, just a few old buildings are left for heritage tourism, local artists, and real estate developers keen to gentrify the area.

The Etzel Museum, which celebrates the history of the Irgun, a Zionist militia

"When we say Tel Aviv we don't think about Jaffa and Shapiro," Rotbard told me. "We don't refer to it. When we design maps for tourists this neighborhood and the old city of Jaffa are left out. Architecture serves as a decoy. When we tell the story of Tel Aviv architecturally it enables us to write a history which lacks politics. It was a way to connect the history of Tel Aviv to high culture, to Europe, and above all a way of speaking about Tel Aviv without any reference to the real reasons which made it what it is today."

Rotbard's book dissects this history in forensic, quite exhausting detail, showing how an architectural narrative can lend itself to an entire political ideology. The book itself was extremely well received in Israel even if the arching narrative of the city has remained impregnable. This year may be the first time the book has been published in England but in Israel it's been widely reviewed and reprinted 13 times.

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"When my book came out it was a great shock for people who thought they were not part of it," he told me. "Tel Aviv preferred to write itself an architectural history that excludes certain political facts. So a lot of young people read the book and were astonished that their park was once a Palestinian neighborhood." This realization was an uncomfortable one for Israelis who had no desire to be complicit in dispossession. "Some people living in gentrified Jaffa or the White City in Tel Aviv told me that they had to change their apartment. That happened about ten times."

After leaving the cafe, we walked around the area that inspired much of the book, taking in just a few of the places left out by the city's official architectural narrative from crumbling wells that once served to water Jaffa's orchards to the land where the oranges were once grown.

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If these stories are easy to forget in favor of the White City myth, others are not. Just across the road from Rotbard's house, we paused outside a kindergarten recently used by the children of African refugees. From 2006 to 2012, tens of thousands of asylum seekers flooded across the Sinai desert looking for a better life in Israel—many of them ending up in South Tel Aviv. To counter what they saw as a threat to the Jewish character of the city, a group of West Bank settlers moved into the area in what ultimately lead to anti-African riots and an attack on the school.

If anything good has come from this, it has—according to Rotbard—become harder than ever to see Tel Aviv existing in a political vacuum. The "White City" narrative has been punctured somewhat, but there's still much work to be done. Before we parted, I asked him to recommend a building that encapsulates everything he had told me. He pointed me towards the waterfront of what was once the Northern tip of Jaffa, to a museum dedicated to the Jewish paramilitary organization that conquered the area.

Inserted into the shell of an old Palestinian house, in a neighborhood now completely wiped out, the museum offers a shockingly one-sided history of how Tel Aviv came into being, celebrating the militias that destroyed the area instead of commemorating what was lost. It's a reminder of how powerful and pervasive the narrative of the White City can be and a reminder, as Rotbard says in his beginning of his book, that "cities and histories" are all constructed in the same way: "always by the victor, always for the victor, and always according to the victor's record."

Follow Philip Kleinfeld on Twitter.

Thumbnail image via Shia's motivational speech

Shia LaBeouf has been keeping himself busy ever since he began his transformation from teen star to derelict wildling. He's dabbled in performance art and motivational speaking, and has even decided to start doing his own stunts in movies with mixed results. Now, the tireless creator has made his rap debut in the form of a shaky iPhone video. In it, Shia stumbles through a two-minute freestyle while a bunch of almost-definitely-stoned onlookers bob to his awkward flow and stare at their feet.

It's comforting to know that, while you are grinding away on your work computer, a shirtless Shia LaBeouf is out there in the world somewhere, probably gobbling down fistfuls of mushrooms and rapping about how he's "so underground that the rap kids call him Tubman." The man cannot be tamed.

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Athenians in line at a cashpoint following the announcement of the referendum on Saturday morning. All photos by Panagiotis Maidis.

This article originally appeared on VICE Greece.

Marking my ballot in this Sunday's referendum is going to be one of those moments I remember forever. The referendum for a new Greek bailout, called by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday, is one that our grandkids will be reading about in history books decades from now. A yes vote will mean accepting a deal from foreign creditors and subjecting ourselves to more austerity, while a no means shunning the cash and seeing what happens next.

Of course, by most estimations, what happens next in the case of a winning no vote is that Greece will have to leave the Euro and return to the national currency, the drachma. As you can probably understand, having to make that decision is pretty stressful.

We took to the streets of Athens to ask young Greeks if they know which way they'll be voting this Sunday.

Giannis

I'll probably vote no.I don't think things can get any worse, so there's really nothing to lose. As a nation, we must learn to stand on our own two feet and if that means having our own currency, then so be it.

Nadia

I will be voting yes.I want to stay in Europe, although it isn't that clear what exactly it is that's at stake. I would like to have some more time to get informed, but there's no way I'm abstaining.

George

I'm voting no.They can suck my dick, if that answers your question. I want us out of this whole Euro-IMF thing. I can't see a future in it, can you?

Panagiotis

I'm going to vote, but I'm not sure whether it's going to be yes or no. I've read about what the Troika and the EU are offering, but then you go online and what you read tells a different story. We should all get ourselves properly informed before voting. There's still a week to go.

Generally speaking, I'm pro-Europe, but what is that Europe we are talking about? That's the issue here. I'm all for the fundamental values Europe was built on, but I feel that it has now transformed into a banking system.

Irene

I'm probably going for a yes vote; That is, I want us to remain a part of Europe. That's what's they seem to be asking—Europe or no Europe? It may seem to be a case of accepting or rejecting the proposal of our lenders, but the real question behind this referendum is basically, "Europe or no Europe."

Sakis

I'll be voting no, so we can exit the Euro and be done with it. Things will only get worse with a yes vote. If we go bankrupt, at least they'll stop asking us for stuff like more taxes or higher interest rates. They'll just stop.

Giorgina

I'm definitely voting on Sunday, I just don't know what. They're putting us all through a process that just isn't fair on the people. They should have come to a decision on their own.

Irene

I haven't decided yet. The main issue here is: What is it exactly that we are voting on? If this is a "Europe or no Europe" vote or a "Euro or no Euro" vote, then I don't want to leave either. On the other hand, if it's a vote on a new memorandum, then obviously I don't want to have any further austerity measures imposed on my country. As it stands, we haven't even been told what the Greek government is proposing. If nothing changes until Sunday, I'm voting yes.

Olga and Stefanos

We won't be voting. We'll be on holiday. We've already booked ferry tickets to the island of Lefkada. That's where we'll be on Sunday, unless we go bankrupt before.

Whether it's paying your rent or feeding yourself, life in modern New York is expensive as hell, and that includes dealing with the criminal justice system. In 2013, almost 16,000 New Yorkers were unable to make bail set at $2,000 and less for low-level offenses, landing many of them in the halls of Rikers Island or the city's other detention complexes. According to city council data, over 6,000 people couldn't pay bail ranging from $500 to as low as 20 bucks.

This underlying economic reality of the city's criminal justice system is one of the reasons NYC's jail system is bigger (and more expensive) than those in several states. (Not helping matters is intense regulation of "quality of life" offenses as part of broken windows policing, which effectively targets low-income people of color.)

But tucked away into a $78.5 billion budget passed by New York's City Council on Friday afternoon is a bail fund of $1.4 million, set aside to assist people facing bail under $2,000. The idea, spearheaded by Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, is that the city would save a ton of money (it costs NYC $450 per inmate per day and the average stay is 24 days, according to Mark-Viverito) by bailing out these people instead of putting them up in jail for weeks, months, or even years.

"New York City's broken bail system has failed to uphold equal justice for a generation of young people, subjecting too many New Yorkers to needless incarceration and abuse simply because they could not afford to post a low bail while awaiting trial," Speaker Mark-Viverito said in a statement. "We have heard too many heartbreaking stories of the long-term, debilitating consequences of even a short stay on Rikers Island, and there is growing consensus across the city and the nation that we need comprehensive criminal justice reform—and we need it now."

The model is a citywide replica of an initiative known as the Bronx Freedom Fund, which was started in 2007 to assist those arrested in the outer borough. By paying bail, the Fund's organizers argue that thousands of dollars in taxpayer money is saved in the long run.

"Even a day or two in jail can have an incredibly destructive impact on someone who can't afford bail," Alyssa Work, a project director at the Fund, told me over email. "People lose jobs, housing, and a fair chance to litigate their case. A citywide bail fund will help the thousands of New Yorkers incarcerated before trial because they are too poor to secure their own freedom."

However, the fund, as it stands, does not offer assistance to those with a violent criminal record. That technicality makes little to no sense, Brian Sonenstein, an activist and writer for Prison Protest, argues, because bail is often set only for those with past criminal offenses. In other words: low-level offenders with no criminal records rarely have to pay bail, so what difference will this actually make?

"New York judges can't use risk of flight or harm to others in considering bail, so the vague reassurance that the city will determine who deserves it and who doesn't just strikes me as unjustified and cruel," Sonenstein told me. "If the situation is so bad that the City Council is proposing taxpayers bail people out of its jails, I think it's time for the state to consider revising or abolishing the bail system entirely."

"It's a sad state of affairs that city lawmakers would have to basically institutionalize the work of charitable organizations in order to confront the state's bail crisis," he added.

Still, the fund is the latest in a series of reforms intended to reduce the massive cost of policing in New York City. The Brooklyn District Attorney's office made a recent push to clear some of the million-plus outstanding warrants in town, and Mayor Bill de Blasio has also started a program known as Justice Reboot, which seeks to clean up some of the clutter of the New York City summons system. As of Friday, 42 percent of that backlog has been taken care of, a mayoral spokesperson said. (The budget also includes money for 1,300 new cops, who will be hired in part with money saved by reducing overtime for current officers.)

"The Mayor has been clear about the need for bail reform, and we applaud the Speaker's leadership on this vital issue," Amy Spitalnick, spokeswoman for the mayor on budget issues, said in an email. "It's simply unacceptable that the size of a person's bank account—rather than the risk they pose—determines whether someone is in jail or with their family while they await trial. Key reforms must happen on the State level. We are also evaluating what we can do here to increase supervised release slots citywide, which would be an important step forward in moving beyond money bail and the inequities it often causes."

Check out our documentary about Norway's famously progressive prison system.

Kalief Browder, the 22-year-old who recently committed suicide after he was struggling to hack it in the city upon his release from a three-year stint on brutality-ridden Rikers Island without trial, had owed $3,000 bail for allegedly stealing a backpack. He would not have qualified for the fund.

Follow John Surico on Twitter.

Oh sure, you don't get as much done in a day if you're crippled by fear. But think about it: you don't encounter as much danger, do you? Eh? Photo via Flickr user Casey Muir-Taylor

Up until a few months ago I was convinced that I had horrible-smelling breath. The kind that causes people to talk behind your back when you leave the room and makes people wonder if it's okay for their health to talk to you. The kind that's so bad the only explanation is that something tragic happened in your mouth and it's now haunted forever.

This fear, like a lot of them, was a leftover from childhood when my best friend and main bully (ah, childhood, what a time) told me that his parents thought my breath smelled like shit. For the next 17 years, I obsessed over this. Every time I talked to someone in close proximity, I was consumed with worry over what they were thinking. Every whisper I gave was a moment of peak anxiety. Any piece of gum offered to me was met with suspicion.

The worst part? It was all in my head. I found out one night as I was lying in bed with my girlfriend and decided to confront my fear. "Amanda, I need to talk to you about something."

"What is it?" she replied, her eyes wide with apprehension that I was about to confess to a crime or affair.

"Be honest. How bad is my breath? Just tell me."

"What are you talking about? I've never thought that once."

"Oh... well, good to know."

Three years ago, my therapist diagnosed me with Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), which is described as chronic over-worrying. I live in a state of constant fear and worry, which loses none of its power even though it is unprovoked and unnecessary. I take medication for it.

At first I resisted a prescription because GAD doesn't sound like a disorder as much as it just sounds like the human condition, like I was diagnosed with "being alive right now." Very quickly, though, the medication helped me realize how many of what I thought were normal worries were actually products of a malfunctioning brain: 98 percent of the fears and dread I had were insubstantial, illusory.

Irrational fears have been a constant companion my entire life, bad breath being just one example. Another was a strong fear of vampires that lasted deep into my 20s. In fact, it lasted until I started taking medication. Vampires. I'm a university graduate, but damned if I didn't think Dracula was going to get me while I was walking alone at night.

Of course, it doesn't take a disorder to suffer from irrational fears, it's just I have a little more practise at recognizing them. And I bet if you were to take the fear you are most embarrassed of and asked a friend about it they would have no clue what you were talking about, like me and my phantom bad breath.

But here's the thing: it's okay to be afraid. I hate that self-help guru "live a life free from fear" nonsense. I can't imagine what it would even be like to be fearless. I like fear. Fear keeps you sharp. It makes you think things through, helps you solve your problems. Fear can inspire you to fight and/or run for your life, depending on where you fall on that particular spectrum. Fear is your friend.

No, I don't think that we should beat or conquer fear. I think that we should fear better. That means not being lazy and assuming you're stuck with the fears you have. I was afraid of pandemics, and news stories about any new flu would make me queasy. Then I examined it closer and realized the truly scary thing about a pandemic to me is that I would get others sick. I wasn't afraid of illness but that I would be responsible for hurting the people I care about.

We live in a golden age of fear. We've never had more interesting or challenging fears as a society. On top of that, we've never had access to more information about said fears. We have a veritable smorgasbord of delicious fears spread out in front of us and each unique, terrifying one, should it strike your fancy, can reveal something about ourselves. So let's not waste our time with the fear-buffet equivalent of filling up on bread by worrying about things like will anyone notice if you don't go to that birthday party.

I'm never going to be a brave person. This isn't an essay for the brave. Brave people can continue climbing mountains or standing up for themselves or whatever it is they get up to. This is an essay for people who've never had a social interaction they couldn't obsess over or a news story they couldn't extrapolate into being about their own doom. To you, my fellow cowards, I say appreciate your fears! Because they are bountiful. Without the baseless fear of having bad breath I never would have started flossing in the shower, which is now one my favourite activities. (Seriously, it's the best. You never forget to floss and you have a reason to stay in the shower for longer. A+.) We, the chickens and wimps of the world, do not have to be courageous. That's not us. We get to walk through the world with the same simple question for every new experience: "Should I be scared of this?"

Jordan Foisy is a stand-up comedian in Toronto.

Follow him on Twitter and check out his new podcast Should I Be Scared Of This at iTunes or brothersdepaul.com.

New York City's Pride Parade erupted on Sunday after the US Government finally came to their senses last week and made same-sex marriage legal across the country. It was an ecstatic and powerful day and everyone was swept up in the celebration, including one NYPD officer who was caught on film grinding with a marcher to MJ's "Don't Stop Til You Get Enough."

The whole thing ended with a kiss on the cop's neck, a love tap to his badge, and a reminder that some police officers are real human beings with real emotions. It's nice to know that the whole thing is cool with the Police Commissioner, as well.

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The hunt for David Sweat and Richard Matt lasted for more than three weeks. Photo via New York State Police

The alternately terrifying and salacious 23-day manhunt for escaped murderer-Lothario duo David Sweat and Richard Matt came to an end over the weekend. Sweat, a 35-year-old convicted cop killer, was shot twice in the torso by a state trooper near the Canadian border around 3 PM Sunday. Photos show the shirtless fugitive being pumped with oxygen and shackled at the legs as New York State Police took him into custody.

"The nightmare is finally over," Governor Andrew Cuomo said in a news conference Sunday night, as reported by the New York Times. "These were really dangerous, dangerous men."

After Sweat and Matt made a ballsy escape from Clinton Correction Facility in Dannemora on June 6, State Police Major Charles Guess told CNN they could "literally be anywhere." But as it turns out, they hadn't strayed very far at all. Once DNA evidence pinned them to a cabin about 15 miles west of the prison, it was only a matter of time before cops closed in.

Matt, who was in prison for dismembering his ex-boss over some pocket change and subsequently became famous for allegedly having a humongous cock, was fatally shot in the head by a federal agent Friday. He was reportedly wielding a 20-gauge shotgun at the time, and a source told the New York Post he might have been wasted on some "grape liquor" in his final moments.

It's shocking that either inmate evaded police as long as they did. Joyce Mitchell, the 51-year-old prison tailor who reportedly slept with at least one of the escapees, allegedly helped the duo break out by smuggling tools into the prison. But when it came to driving the getaway car—Cuomo said Monday the plan was to head to Mexico—she bailed, forcing Sweat and Matt to improvise on foot. Sweat was about two miles from the Canadian border when he was confronted by State Police Sergeant Jay Cook, who eyed him jogging along the side of the road.

It appears as if the men stuck together for the majority of their time out from behind bars, eating peanut butter and possibly employing tricks from the movies like using pepper to conceal their scent from tracking dogs. They likely moved from cabin to cabin near Mountain View, a hunter's enclave described by one regional paper as a "wall of green" that's easy to get lost in.

Conditions were harsh. Bloody socks and an autopsy report on Matt show that the escapees' feet were torn up from constantly being on the move. It was also raining heavily during much of the pair's final days of freedom.

Check out our documentary on Norway's famously progressive prison system.

According to Cuomo, Sweat told investigators after his arrest that he and Matt parted ways about five days ago because the older man was slowing him down. It is unclear whether or not the burdensome weight of Matt's humongous dick contributed to his slower pace.

The Times reports that Sweat's condition has improved but that he will remain in the hospital for a few days.

Governor Cuomo has yet to reveal how much was spent on the exhaustive search for the inmates, which included over 1,300 officers, saying only that it was "expensive" but "worth it."

Follow Allie Conti on Twitter.

Read more comics by Lauren Monger at her Tumblr.

Graphics via Forum Research

Canadians aren't the biggest fans of C-51, the anti-terrorism bill that is now law.

While that much might have been clear for months, a new poll shows how the debate over the issue may help explain the NDP's rise in the polls.

Video via DAILY VICE

A survey conducted by Forum Research on June 22-23 and provided exclusively to VICE shows that opposition to C-51 is as high as it's ever been, as fully 41 percent of Canadians are against the security legislation, while 39 percent support it. A sizable 20 percent of those polled were unsure about C-51.

What's more important for Canada's three main political parties is exactly who is opposed to the bill.

The poll found that more than half of those who voted for the NDP, Liberal, Green, and, in Quebec, the Bloc Quebecois, in the last election are unhappy with C-51. Unsurprisingly, 61 percent of those who cast their ballot for Stephen Harper in 2011 are supportive of the legislation.

C-51, of course, vastly expands information sharing between organizations like CSIS and CSE, while making it possible for Canada's spies to "disrupt" threats.

The poll shows that many of the opponents of the bill may have already jumped ship from the Liberal Party, who endorsed the bill.

The NDP are currently sitting on top of the polls, with an eight-point lead over the Liberals and Conservatives. That's near majority territory.

The Liberals, meanwhile, have maintained that they want to fix the bill if they get elected, but that they support the legislation in broad strokes. When we sat down with Trudeau earlier in June, he insisted that his party was in total agreement with his decision.

A quarter of those who voted Liberal in 2011 said the debate around C-51 made them more likely to vote NDP.

The effect is especially pronounced among youth, who are the most likely to oppose the law. Nearly 30 percent of those under 35 said their opposition to the anti-terrorism law would push them to support Thomas Mulcair's party.

It's not all bad news for the Liberals, however. About one-in-ten said they would be more likely to vote Liberal because of C-51, which is slightly higher than those who said Trudeau's support for it had turned them off of the Liberal Party.

When Forum asked, earlier this month, what issues would push Canadians to change their vote, over half said a party vowing to repeal C-51 could earn their vote. That put it below some other mainstays of political concern—healthcare, pensions—but nevertheless put it in a tier of issues that may actually make a difference, especially in pushing youth to go to the polls.

The last time VICE checked in on support for the bill, more than half of those who were aware of the bill opposed it. This time, Forum asked everyone, even those who weren't very familiar with the law.

The poll, conducted on June 22 and 23, randomly phoned 1,268 people. It is considered accurate +/- three percent, 19 times out of 20.

Follow Justin Ling on Twitter.

All photos by Alexander Coggin

Hitting up all the LGBT events on Gay Pride Day in Berlin can be demanding for the average Queen or Berliner, but if you're Gloria Viagra—drag icon, nightlife celebrity, and notorious party host—it's an all-consuming 24-hours where your brand is contingent upon visibility throughout the whole city. Pride to Viagra is what the Oscars are to Meryl Streep.

This past Saturday, the Berlin native born Michel (she wouldn't share her last name or age—responding to "How old are you?" with "Blonde!") sat atop two floats at the Nollendorfplatz Parade, took photos with fans at the queer-centric fair KCSD, stopped by a party at the legendary gay bar Roses, and DJ'ed at the club Arena for an event called District Pride.

Photographer Alexander Coggin spent the whole day with Viagra from when she put on her make up and wig in the morning, to midday outfit changes, to her big DJ set at the end of the night. The "Empire State Building of Drag" (Viagra clocks in at a colossal 7'2" with heels) was an undeniable celebrity—not a minute went by without someone asking for a photo or shouting her name in praise. From 11 AM on Saturday past 5 AM on Sunday, this is how Gloria Viagra spent Pride in Berlin.

11:30 AM: Gloria's look, pre-drag.

1 PM: Gloria first (of several) completed costumes

2 PM: Meeting and greeting friends and fans at the Nollendorplatz Parade

2:30 PM: On the CSD e. V Float with friends

4 PM: On the GMF Float

7 PM: With Drag Queens Barbie Breakout and Fixie Fate at the Brandenburg Gate

10:30 PM: At the famous gay bar Roses for some socializing

12:45 AM: Back at Gloria's home in Schoneberg for a costume change

1:30 AM: Quick pitstop at the bar Lieblingsbar for a shot

2:00 AM: Meeting and greeting fans at the party District Pride

3:30 AM: DJ'ing at Arena for the District Pride party

5:15 AM: Waiting for a cab home at the end of the night

For more of Alexander's work, visit his website here.

This article originally appeared on VICE Greece.

Greece may very well be the birthplace of theater, philosophy, democracy, and the first radical left government in Europe, but nothing outshines the bizarre economic traditions that the small Balkan country has managed to establish since its inception. For instance, it has a long-standing habit of borrowing vast sums of money with painfully large interest rates, only to fork it right back over by buying various goodies from the West—primarily weapons.

The reason behind all this is most likely some sort of compulsion. How else can you explain a state whose borders haven't been threatened since 1922—a state that hasn't suffered a domestic attack since 1944—spending so much money on weapons?

It gets more confusing. To start with, the exact date of the establishment of the Greek state is disputed. Many Greeks maintain that the country was founded on May 1, 1827, during the Fourth National Assembly, held in Troezen. However, the major powers of Europe didn't recognize Greece as a sovereign state until February 3, 1830. Then there are others who claim the conception of the Greek state was, in fact, November 30, 1823. That's when the country—which wasn't actually even a sovereign state yet—took out its first major loan.

On that date, the British Bankers Group granted an £800,000 [$1.3 million] loan to the leadership of the Greek revolution against the Ottomans. Most of this was earmarked for the purchase of munitions, and the remainder was spent covering the basic needs of the rebel territories.

THE FIRST BANKRUPTCY

Barely four years after the non-existent Greek state's first loan, the "country" declared its first bankruptcy by failing to pay off the loan's interest.

Sixty-six years later, in 1893, then-Prime Minister Charilaos Trikoupis announced Greece's second bankruptcy with the historic phrase: "Regretfully, we are bankrupt."

"The bankruptcy under the Trikoupis government was different," according to Thanos Vermis, Professor of Political Science and Public Administration at the University of Athens. "The first British loans were spent on the civil conflicts that followed the revolution of 1821. Essentially, the Greek state didn't even exist at that point. The default under Charilaos Trikoupis had separate characteristics. It happened because of over-borrowing, but those loans resulted in infrastructure projects that actually benefited the Greek people—for example, that's when the railways, that are still in use today, were built. It was a bankruptcy that actually gave something back."

Read on VICE Sports: Beatings, Bribery, and Match Fixing in Greek Football

The truth is, for better or worse, historically, bankruptcies seem to be the prerogative for modernizing Greece's politics. "I don't believe that there ever was, or is, a Greek tradition of imprudent lending," countered Yiannis Miols, Professor of Political Economy at the University of Athens, and long-time head of the Economics team.

He continued, "Borrowing always takes two: the lender and the borrower. Loans only appear reckless when things go wrong. The responsibility should be considered to be shared from the get-go. If you scratch the surface, you'll notice that almost all of the countries that have defaulted during peacetime did so during international financial crises. A common mistake of both the creditors and the debtors is that, during good times, they anticipate that things will only get better."

Defaults in Europe between the 19th Century and WWII:

Germany (Prussia) defaulted in 1807, 1813, 1932, and 1939.
Spain in 1809, 1820, 1831, 1834, 1851, 1867, 1872, 1882, 1936, 1937, 1938, and 1939.
Austria in 1868, 1914, and 1932.
Portugal in 1828, 1837, 1841, 1845, 1952, and 1890.
France in 1701, 1715, 1770, 1788, and 1812.

Greece is no exception. In 1932, the country declared bankruptcy due to the inability of another PM, Eleftherios Venizelos, to understand the consequences of the economic crash of 1929 and, instead, continue to peg the country's then-currency (drachma) to gold and the British pound.

Historian Thanos Vermis notes: "The Greek bankruptcy under Eleftherios Venizelos and his opposition leader, Panagis Tsaldaris, forced Greece to turn to their internal market and led to the development of the rural economy. The ordinary person in the countryside didn't feel the effects of the crisis because they were self-sufficient. The problems were mainly shared by those who were trading Greek bonds and the upper class, who were certainly fewer than they are today.

"Greece at that time was a vulnerable economy with a small output and no heavy industry, few exports and no tourism—something that was later developed to fill the gaps in the budget. Today, the absence of national benefits and the explosion of the urban population, coupled with the fact that the Greek countryside has shrunk dramatically, has meant that society is forced to experience a more painful economic crisis."

GREECE AFTER THE GREAT WAR

Both the British and the Americans got a taste of the Greek economic establishment during the 1940s, when they each financed the civil war against the Communists.

Winston Churchill gave up before long, defeated in his efforts, and the US took over, launching their famous " Marshall Plan." US officials watched on for several months as their finances were spent on high society functions and weddings, while the Communists strengthened, until they finally installed a tightly-controlled administration.

Throughout the 1950s, American correspondents in Athens spoke of about 5,000 members of the Greek upper class who were basically siphoning off the country's international financing—even using fuel sent for agricultural machinery for their own cars.

Joseph Harrison, correspondent at the time for the Christian Science Monitor, spoke of a gang that "cries all day for their fatherland, but does not deign to pay taxes and maintains the entirety of their deepest in New York, Switzerland, and Egypt." As a modern Greek, it's hard not to draw parallels to today's situation.

Throughout Konstantinos Karamanlis's eight years of governing Greece (1955-1963), the situation only got worse. The credit system began handing out money, mainly to construction contractors, who became instantly rich thanks to the substandard completion of projects. The results of their work are still visible today: tons of useless concrete scattered throughout Athens and roadwork of poor quality.

During the military dictatorship (1967-1974), the Junta continued the custom of lending out money with high interest rates and distributing it among a the political ruling class and the military machine. In July of 1974, during the invasion of Cyprus, Greece finally got to use some of its weapons, but was defeated by the Turkish military—which meant they needed to take new loans out in order to buy new weapons and recover.

ANDREAS PAPANDREOU RUSHES IN

Greece's entry into the European Union in 1981 was a key moment in its history. Paradoxically, it took place at the same time as the takeover of government by the Socialist Party, which, once in power, immediately changed their anti-EEC rhetoric.

All of a sudden, their priority was to claim financing for the Greek economy through their newly established "Mediterranean programs." This was a strategic development plan aimed at improving socio-economic structures in less developed regions and caused a lot of friction between Greek Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou and Margaret Thatcher. Because of that program, Papandreou managed to redistribute the wealth in the country. On the other hand, his decision to nationalize big private industries didn't end well: the public sector grew, and so did unemployment, inflation, and budgetary holes.

KOSTAS SIMITIS'S GRAND IDEA

In the years that followed, life went on among fiscal austerity programs, while 1996 brought a couple of worrying developments: Greece's Olympic bid and the growing interest in entering the Euro.

Greece's then-Minister of Sport, George Lianis, took advantage of the political instability of the time to submit a bid for Athens to organize the 2004 Olympic Games. Greece's win caused a massive surge in national enthusiasm.

Just prior to the win, the political instability had been calmed by Kostas Simitis—a man who set large goals for Greece and its entrance into a new currency—taking over as prime minister. His modernization program, which aimed to ensure the health of the Greek economy and its entry into the Euro, admittedly spawned spectacular results, but in reality it was all a master-class in faking financial data.

Today, several European leaders blame Greece for its trickery. At that time, however, any voice criticizing either the EU's criteria or government tampering was given a hard time: Europe had to display healthy economies within its borders.

THE MIRACLE OF THE STOCK EXCHANGE AND THE NEW CURRENCY

Until 2004, a large section of Greek society floated on a cloud of artificial euphoria. Polished Jeeps lined the streets of Greek provinces, and Havana cigars became popular among Greek men with easy access to credit cards and endless loans.

At that point, banks were handing out money to anyone, even if you were just going to use it to book a holiday. Thanks to this, the Greek banking system methodically inflated its own bubble, which in turn led to bubbles in construction, media, tourism, and elsewhere. This, in turn, sparked an explosive rise within the Greek stock market, which devolved into an even more explosive crash. Its value rose from 1,200 to 6,500 points, only to fall to 666 within a year.

Finance Minister Yiannos Papantoniou brazenly dragged his smile from panel to panel, claiming that "the Greek stock market is still going strong. This summer, Greece has a stock exchange that's the envy of many other international stock exchanges." Just a few years later, €136 billion [$152 billion] had disappeared from the stock exchange.

On January 1, 2002—the Euro's circulation date—Prime Minister Kostas Simitis was photographed holding the country's first note in his hands, ominously looking like a very happy man.

Warning signs were already emerging in 2004 when Greece won UEFA Euro 2004 and played host to the Olympic Games, but, as we all know too well, after the binge comes the hangover. The private debt of Greeks became unsustainable, banks demanded their money back, many had lost a fortune in the stock market, and public finances were going from bad to worse. Blame was exchanged between rival political parties as unemployment began to slowly rise. This was before the US bank crisis had even broken out.

THE ERA OF THE CRISIS

Cheap immigrant labor, meant to finance the Greek dream, was implemented. Rumors of airplanes shipping illegal workers from Asia directly into construction sites, from which they didn't leave until after the completion of the Olympic stadiums, didn't seem to bother anyone particularly; all everyone cared about was not having to see those immigrants in public spaces.

The first far-right groups began forming at the turn of the millennium. When the global banking crisis broke, Greece found itself with an economy that was completely defenseless.

Newly elected Prime Minister George Papandreou didn't exactly handle the situation ideally. The politician, who was elected for promising to continue the work of his father, Andreas, found himself quickly being forced to announce that Greece was in the grip of the IMF, the European Central Bank, and the European Commission—paving the way for the greatest social crisis in 70 years.

George Papandreou's assurances—summed up in his memorable quote: "There is money"—was soon drowned out by Theodoros Pangalos's equally historic phrase: "We all consumed it together."

Pensions and wages fell dramatically, businesses closed, unemployment soared to exceptional levels, and social services shrank. Meanwhile, public debt continued to grow as a result of the collapse of public revenue caused by the policies of the Troika.

When Papandreou inexplicably tried to propose, amid massive protests, a referendum about whether or not to continue these measures, he was made to step down. His position was filled by the former head of the Greek Central Bank, Tassos Giannitsis, who had stood smiling next to Prime Minister Kostas Simitis as he held up the first euro banknote and was seen by many as responsible for the controversial way in which Greece joined the euro. He was hired to the applause of European leaders. In the elections that followed in May of 2012, the neo-Nazi fringe party Golden Dawn was catapulted from a few hundred votes to 7 percent of the national share.

The old political system crumbled. The Socialist Party PASOK collapsed from 43 percent to 12 percent of the vote, and Syriza (Coalition of the Radical Left) quadrupled its strength. The leader of the conservative party, Antonis Samaras, took advantage of the fractured voting and was elected Prime Minister.

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FIRST SAMARAS, THEN THE LEFT

Antonis Samaras had made a career for himself as the leader of a failed neo-nationalist party in the 1990s. As Prime Minister, he attempted to rule by creating a neo-conservative hegemony based on repression, racism, and a vitriolic anti-left stance.

We will never know what he could have been capable of under different circumstances, but with the unemployment rate at that point touching 30 percent, and with incomes halved, his justifications sounded very disturbing.

The victory of Syriza in the elections this January (the fourth election in five years) was a comfortable one. The Greek people's expectations of the new government were simultaneously nothing and everything. People seemed desperate for the situation to return to tolerable levels.

The image of the newly-elected Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakias publicly discrediting the country's lenders on television and conversing with BBC journalists in fluent English created a storm of enthusiasm in the country. Suddenly, the whole population felt as if one Greek had taken revenge on behalf of an entire country that had been insulted and harassed by everyone for five years. But that illusion didn't last long.

The minister's bluff of not wanting more funding was poorly thought out, given that he didn't actually have another plan at hand. Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras's claim that he would make German Chancellor Angela Merkel "an offer she can't refuse" proved to be far less effective than when Vito Corleone uttered it in The Godfather.

One month after the election, the government signed a temporary extension of the monetary assistance program. In keeping with tradition, the government put in orders for more military equipment.

"It's clear that the government and opposition aren't pro or anti-bailout. We need to overcome the status quo in order to stop living the torment of Sisyphus," said Pantelis Economou, deputy Finance Minister of PASOK.

Worn out, Greek society constantly plays down the depth of their social struggle and upheaval. It's a society that seems ready to surrender to any sort of a miracle. The debate about whether or not Greece's debt is sustainable has also begun to wear thin: everyone knows that the debt isn't sustainable, but nobody wants to admit it.

Even now, many seem convinced that, in the end, something will be figured out—that something will happen that stops the country from being kicked out of the euro, a scenario they consider a nightmare. Even now, with the country on the edge of a national disaster and with people running to empty ATMs due to the imposed capital controls, many are hoping for a miracle to come along and save their country.

Of course, Greek history shows that these miracles rarely come.

Read more about Greece on VICE.