No Agenda Episode 1363 - "Attribution Science"

  No Agenda Episode 1363 - "Attribution Science"
    "Attribution Science"
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  Credits
    "Attribution Science"
    Executive Producers:
      Viscount Bob of the Piedmont Triad
      Sir RJ of Grand Point
      Sir Ten Cryptids, Keeper of Lore
      Dame Simone
      Austin Paris
      Claire Hayes
      Black Knight Big loaf of the BLAZ
    Associate Executive Producers:
      Mason Strong
      Ellen Murray
      Jacob Cogar
      Sir Don Filipchuk
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    Title Changes
      Baron Bob of High Point -> Viscount Bob of the Piedmont Triad
    Knights & Dames
      Simone -> Dame Simone
      Bob From Missouri -> Sir Ten Cryptids, Keeper of Lore
      Rick Fawcett -> Sir RJ of Grand Point
    Art By: Darren O'Neill
    End of Show Mixes: Neal Jones - Sir Chris Wilson - Tom Starkweather
    Engineering, Stream Management & Wizardry
      Mark van Dijk - Systems Master
      Ryan Bemrose - Program Director
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    Chapters: Dreb Scott
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  Cover Art
    Art By: Darren O'Neill
  Shownotes
    Vaccine Hestiancy
      Coronavirus UK Live: Covid passports ‘will be compulsory in pubs, clubs and restaurants’
      Dr. Jan Grandjean over Corona
      CHA Doorknocking Info and Script 20210407_202104071400178175.pdf
      Why most people who now die with Covid in England have had a vaccination
        Don’t think of this as a bad sign, it’s exactly what’s expected from an effective but imperfect jab
        Link
      Heineken - -The night belongs to the vaccinated NOT
      Vaccine questions: just moved already answered - don't want to be counted twice!
      President of Suriname - shoppen - foorball - taxi - fly - covid passport Otherwise you will be Isolated
      WHO Lawsuit
        In the PDF I translated this article about the Indian Bar Association calling for Legal Action for Vaccination Deaths.
        It looks like the Gates foundation got included and Tedros Ghebreyesus too!
        Indische Anwaltskammer fordert gerichtliche Schritte wegen Todesfällen nach Impfungen -.pdf
      Rewards haven’t provided big boost for Nevada COVID-19 vaccinations
        Gov. Steve Sisolak’s offer of a chance to win a million-dollar prize hasn’t resulted in a noticeable uptick in COVID-19 vaccinations in Nevada, at least not so far.
        Sisolak announced a state raffle on June 17 in which vaccinated residents could win a total of $5 million in prizes, including college tuition and a $1 million grand prize. The rewards were intended to boost the state’s declining numbers of new vaccinations.
        Brian Labus, an assistant professor of epidemiology and biostasticis at UNLV’s School of Public Health, said the offer didn’t immediately result in big gains.
        “There wasn’t a giant spike in people vaccinated the next day,” he said when asked to review vaccination data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Through Friday, the seven-day daily average of first doses administered also appeared to continue its downward trend.
        Link
      Xavier Becerra - Wikipedia
    Delta Variant
      Follow the science: ‘Deadly’ Delta variant registers a 99.9+% recovery rate
    Cyber Pandemic
      Cyber insurance
        Please don't mention me by name, I am "an anonymous industry professional with standing" for the purposes of this email.
        Sorry for the massive delay in delivering this, as you can imagine, things have been a bit busy lately in the world of brokering Cyber insurance. I am going to break this email into three parts, hopefully something can be useful for the show (I have underlined and Highlighted the one part I know you may find most interesting for the show tomorrow).
        I can provide more standing credentials, if needed, but I would categorize myself as being in the top tier of talent in my industry. Feel free to shoot me any questions that any of the below may stir up. Sorry this is VERY long.
        Cyber Coverage Overview
        Cyber cover is really three different types of coverage wrapped into one, but all center around some form of unauthorized access to computer systems to trigger coverage. There is the liability component, the first party coverage, and cyber crime extensions.
        Liability covers the costs and expenses associated with notifying individuals of compromised data, providing credit monitoring services, and a few other items like paying Payment Card Industry fines and penalties or even media liability.
        First party coverage is the breach response. If an insured's system is breached, you can gain access to computer forensics, PR teams, legal services, etc, etc. Also, this is where you get coverage for business interruption (loss of income) for a period in which your system may be shut down, or if a third party on whom you rely is shut down for a Cyber event.
        Most notably, this is the part of the policy where Ransomware/Extortion is covered. This has been the problem child in the industry and you can see below for ways they are trying to deal with it.
        Lastly, a good broker adds in some Cyber crime extensions. This is for stuff like social engineering attacks, funds transfer fraud, and the one I like best is invoice manipulation fraud (also called "reverse social engineering"). This is if a bad actor gains access to my system and manipulates an invoice to get my customer to send funds to the wrong place.
        So, these policies are traditionally very broad in coverage they can provide and the coverage trigger is broad as well, typically some form of "actual or suspected unauthorized access".
        Cyber Market Overview
        When this product originally came out, it was written dirt cheap and no one understood the potential scope of the losses carriers would sustain. At that point, ransomware payments were a cute $50k average and not the now >$300k industry average. Also, the cost of a compromised record has continued to swell in terms of notification and monitoring costs, we are up near $300 per record. If a company has records compromised it isn't just a few at a time, as you know. A record breach is going to be on the order of a 7 figure loss, easily.
        Carrier loss ratios have been getting destroyed and they are losing money like crazy. Beazley was a major player on those initial policies and they have had to massively rewrite their book. Policies that used to cost $2,500 are now coming out at $30,000 on renewal quotes depending on industry segment and controls. "Tough classes" are now manufacturing, medical, education, municipalities/cities, or anything deemed to be in the supply chain. I've had to pull so many all-nighters trying to find homes for policies at prices that aren't going to get me fired off the account.
        The market, as recently as two months ago, had pockets of new entrants who would still underwrite accounts with bad controls at competitive pricing, but that has dried up near immediately. A good account can now expect a premium increase of anywhere from 50% to 100% on premium over expiring. That is a good renewal.
        Currently, there is a lot of chatter in the market about carriers severely limiting or even altogether stopping the payments for ransomware/extortion. Insureds do not have enough skin in the game (typical retention can be as low as $25k on an account with $100M revenue). Some carriers are now sub-limiting the ransomware limit and others are implementing a co-insurance so the insured has to pay a portion of every dollar lost.
        In France, AXA (large insurance carrier) has announced they will no longer offer any ransomware cover on new policies and we are waiting to see how the market follows and if that moves to the US. The theory is that the presence of insurance for these events incentivizes higher demands since bad actors know there is potentially a deep pocket to cover the event.
        What I find sketchy is the attacks against our industry in the past few months. CNA (another large insurer) had a massive breach that shut them down for multiple days back in March. More recently, several prominent brokerages have announced breaches they have discovered.
        If insurance is truly incentivizing the higher ransom demands, I think it likely that people are now attacking insurance carriers and brokerages with no intention of demanding ransom, but trying to mine policy data. If hackers can figure out what entities carry what policy limits, they know exactly who to attack and what figures they can extract.
        Additionally, a lot of carriers run non-invasive port scans for open ports on policy holders and save and distribute these reports. My hunch is that we, as an industry, may be providing hackers with the perfect playbook should they access the right portion of our systems.
        Carrier Controls Sought
        Multi-Factor Authentication is God to carriers right now. Almost all carriers have some form of a questionnaire related to this and it will be four or five questions asking if MFA is implemented at log on, for accessing email from mobile device, if there is MFA for admin accounts, etc, etc. Other items that are big are air-gap and encrypted back ups, EDR, and having a response plan in place.
        This is already too long so I am attaching a sample application for your review. This is not fully inclusive of all supplemental apps typically requested, but just a "base application".
        Thank you for your courage and, again, no names, please!
    Covid Down Under
      Cridland BOTG NWO in Sydney
        Yes, that's happening in Sydney: the government is trying to stop the virus from spreading. Same happened in Melbourne last year. (
        @ScottMorrisonMP fucked up the vaccination program here).
        I wouldn't consider a dumb journo's phrase as anything sinister, though.
    Exosomes
      Exosomes ED
        Would like this to be anonymous if you do read it on the show.
        I have went back and forth with this in my mind just because of the incident was very confusing. I have thought a lot about it and finally figured I’d just share it and let’s hope it’s not too awkward.
        Over a month ago a friend purchased a built up mustang. 500hp, fast as hell, and a head turner of a car for others with sports cars at least. The friend had been calling me to come look at it and after a few weeks of working on a day to meet up we finally did at his house.
        Excited to show me what the car “has” we headed out to do about a 25 mile ride around the area and on to the freeway to see what the car ran like in the 120+ mph range.
        So this is the weird twist here. My friend had been feeling under the weather because he had his 2nd jab of the Pfizer vax the day before. He said he had been feeling sick for about 2 weeks, which was when he had got the first jab. He said he had the typical “massive headache, feeling like he had no energy, and slightly plugged up nasally”.
        We went for the ride, saw some other hot rods on the freeway, which we raced a little, laughing when we pulled away from them with ease. We looped around at a freeway interchange, and headed back to his house, so total time in the car was 45 minutes to an hour or so. After we sat in his garage having a beer for about another hour or so just BS’ing. I headed home after and pretty much crawled in to bed pretty much the moment I walked in the door of my house.
        That night I had some strange dreams that I would akin to when I quit smoking. I quit with the patch and fell asleep with the patch on twice which led to psychotic like very vivid dreams, but these were a tad different. These dreams were much more sexual in nature and is apparently aroused me in my sleep to the point of a nocturnal emission (wet dream). This might not seem weird but I have not had one of these for close to 30 year. I am approaching 50 and I do not have any issues like E.D. but I am certainly not as active in the bed as I used to be. I thought maybe it was medication that I am on, but it only happened one time and has not happened since while I continue to take all the medication I was taking when this happened. Thinking through it the only conclusion that I can come to is that this was a result of sitting close to someone that had gotten the vaccine for an extended period of time.
        I understand this might seem hard to believe but the length of time since I had this happen to me while sleeping till this did happen to me makes me lean toward it being caused by the close contact.
        Keep up the great work, ITM and TYFYC.
    Vaccidents
      Southwest airlines pilots vaccination intel
        So, I have two friends who work as stewardesses for Southwest, and I spent a rather long night last
        night drinking with them. They both dropped a weird piece of intel I wanted to pass on. Remember
        about a month ago, when Southwest suddenly cancelled a ton of flights? I had thought it was a
        hacking thing... it turns out they had no pilots. All their pilots had been vaccinated... and quite
        a few of them started showing blood clots, believed to be a combination of the vaccine and altitude
        thrombosis. Other airlines must be having similar issues.
      Sarasota woman arrested at RSW, accused of spitting on Delta passenger and not wearing a mask
    Magnetic Vaccines
      OK, John, this has bugged me enough (ie. brass keys aren't magnetic) that I forced my wife to get
      vaxxed so I could test this again (my sister from the last video went away on vacation). In this
      video that I just shot today, my wife is freshly vaxxed 48 hours ago and of course, the brass key
      sticks to her arm. So I grabbed a magnet and a paper clip to show that it also sticks. The part you
      can't see is you can feel a pull and a push from the area where she was vaxxed.
      Clearly this isn't magnetism, but some form of devil black magic... I am taking my kids and moving
      to Plfueger ASAP.
      Hope you enjoy the video (
      https://www.dropbox.com/s/wjuuznwp398zx2z/magnet test two.MOV?dl=0
      BTW, I noticed in the video that you can see our PCR test results. We heard that Canada might be
      allowing people to fly if they can prove they had COVID. Well our whole fam damily got the VID in
      April and so me and my two kids got PCR'd, but I guess too much time had passed and we all came
      back negative. There's a lot more to this story, but I'll spare you the details unless you want to
      hear them...
      BUT, my son had to get a blood test and I discovered that at this lab ANYBODY from BC or Ontario
      can go get a "FlyClear" anti-body test for $75 and according to the website, we can fly "clear"
      internationally! This is NOT ADVERTISED ANYWHERE in Canada! I'm hoping to test this out later in
      the year and will report back (possibly from a COVID hotel jail).
    VAERS
      Surgeon who operated on young Italian vaccine victim: ‘You have never seen anything like this’
    Mandatory Vaccination
      Nuremberg Code from WWII has nothing to do with coronavirus despite bogus Facebook claims
        Based on expert opinion, Full Fact concluded that the Nuremberg Code would "only be relevant at the research trial stage of a vaccine's development, not its rollout to the general public".
        "But even then, experts told us they felt it would not be an appropriate link to draw," the fact checkers continued.
        So you have questions about the COVID vaccines? We have answers
        Confused about Australia's vaccine rollout? We've tracked down the answers to the questions you've been asking.Read more
        "It's right that medical ethics should be highly scrutinised, especially in cases like the COVID-19 vaccine roll-out where the process has been accelerated. However, it's important not to mix up the atrocities of the past with current debates about medicine and policy."
        Link
      Professor JJ on Jacobson vs Commonwealth of Massachusetts
        Dear AC,
        I am still editing the analysis, but to answer the BIG questions:
        (1) Yes, Jacobson never had to get ANOTHER injection (recall, he had one many years earlier), and he only paid the fine (5 USD, then the equivalent to a weeks wages for a common labourer)
        (2) at that time, all the case law allowed the unvaccinated people to walk around freely, and interact with whomever they choose, even during an epidemic, of what purportedly had a case fatality rate of at least 10%
        Hence, the Courts would only impose a fine, and LOCKDOWNS of healthy people were rare (at most 7-14 days), and upon a writ of habeas corpus, the local health authorities had to prove that the person in forced quarantine was either sick OR spreading the disease.
        Of course, such was the sad fate of Mary Mallon, but I must voice my opposition to the idea that she spread salmonella - and NO one else in New York City did, AND that others died, solely due to contact with salmonella (typhoid). Millions of Americans have salmonella every year - and no one is blamed for transferring it to others. Such level of contact tracing would be impossible to prove, and just like COVID deaths (with the 2.6 comorbidities), NO ONE who is healthy, dies of salmonella.
        Best
        JCJ
    Supply Chain
      Pepsi shortage
      Container costs
    Shut Up Slave
      Leftovers app - Too Good To Go
    Noodle Gun
      Andy Ngo takedown PCI
        I’m writing to report Things You Should Ngo, linked here: https://podcastindex.org/podcast/13380. Andy and the people he supports open Black people, especially even more marginalised Black people like fat, intersex, TMA, poor, disabled, lesbian, and/or sex working Black people, up to their antiBlack following harassing them to no end by posting screenshots of their tweets. They instigate targeted harassment campaigns against, attack, spout slurs for them including the N-slur, C-slur, T-slur, D-slur, F-slur, A-slur, and H-slur, mock, and spam them. They use death threats, caricatures, symbols, false information, and other hate speech such as endorsing lynchings.
        Andy and his collaborators appropriate Black culture, including BEV and hashtags, events, and movements by and for Black people, delete much of this, are pedophiles, do incest, and are complicit when other nonBlack people do all this and more, such as the other users in the linked posts and videos below. Please act now.
    Ranked Choice Voting
      RCV is unfair - proof
        Adam /John:
        Mathematicians have proven ranked choice voting with 3+ candidates can never be fair. Its called "Arrow's Impossibilty Theorem".
        The theorem says that 1 of 3 of the following "fairness criteria" MUST BE VIOLATED in such an election:
        Unanimity. If every voter prefers alternative X over alternative Y, then the group prefers X over Y.
        Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives. If every voter's preference between X and Y remains unchanged, then the group's preference between X and Y will also remain unchanged (even if voters' preferences between other pairs like X and Z, Y and Z, or Z and W change).
        Non-Dictatorship. There is no "dictator": no single voter possesses the power to always determine the group's preference.
        If the first 2 are upheld, you will have a dictatorship: It will take only 1 vote to determine the outcome.
        Which makes me think... In terms of fraudulent elections, its much easier to fake the results of 1 voter to get your outcome rather than millions. Ranked choice voting seems to open this door.
        Wiki:
        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow's_impossibility_theorem
        10 min video if interested:
        https://youtu.be/Q60ZXoXP6Hg
        TYFYC - looking forward to 1363!
        -Nick
      RCV Australia?
        Hey Adam, as usual love the show.
        I expect these are all views you've heard before and I don't expect this to change anything.
        I grew up in Australia and we have preferential voting where you list your preferences. In other words it sounds exactly like your description of rank choice voting.
        I now live in the UK where they have first past the post and my annecdotal evidence as to the results of preferential voting over first past the post is that it seems to result in more independent candidates gaining office and this results in removing power from the traditionally 2 power parties. Which usually tempers the party in power as they have to negotiate with more people and there's more open criticism of the major parties by the independents or smaller parties.
        The UK is still this notion of if you vote for anyone other than the major parties then you're throwing your vote away. Which I hear echoed in the u.s. and parodied in the Simpsons in that treehouse of horrors VII episode where Bill Clinton and Bob Dole are replaced by aliens Kang and Kodos and people vote for them anyway because it's a two party system.
        So as someone who has lived under both, I prefer preferential voting to first past the post. And I think if you try it.. may may just like it..
        Maybe not.. but maybe..
        Damn I should set up a mastadon instance and federate with NASocial because this is no doubt being discussed on there but I'm lame and haven't even been in the troll Room
      Elise: RCV is just like academy awards
      RCV Wrecked Minneapolis
        An opinion piece in today’s WSJ details the disastrous results of Ranked Choice Voting in Minneapolis.
        The 2017 mayoral election which seated current mayor Jacob Frey (who caved to BLM protestors last summer) was a complicated affair.
        The mayoral race was a 16 candidate affair that took 6 rounds of counting to resolve. With only a 43% voter turnout, Frey was the first choice of only 25% of voters.
        I am thankful that we have runoffs in Georgia to prevent the election of someone by a plurality (less than 50% + 1 of the votes). One person, one vote.
        Carwin Chambliss
        Atlanta, GA
        https://www.wsj.com/articles/ranked-choice-voting-helped-wreck-minneapolis-11625854937
    Out There
      Navy picks Mercury Systems to provide airborne electronic warfare (EW) technology to confuse enemy radar
    Hearing Aids
      Breaking: Biden to Sign Order on OTC Hearing Aids
        The marketplace for direct-to-consumer (DTC) hearing aids is alive and well. One can go to Google, search for “buy online FDA registered hearing aid”, and see a myriad of options, with and without remote support from a licensed practitioner. In other words, the market is highly unregulated, and access to alternative products without the “red tape” is already possible. In fact, the pandemic ushered in an era of growth for companies like Eargo, a publicly-traded company that sells DTC hearing aids online.
        At the same time, the wildly successful Apple AirPods Pro already provide hearing-aid-like features like personalized amplification, background noise reduction, and (coming soon) hyper-directional beamforming microphones. While limited in their amplification capabilities, the AirPods Pro cost $249 or less (when on sale), and the market is predicted to be in the hundreds of millions (units sold).
        And Bose recently launched an FDA-approved DTC hearing aid—the Bose SoundControl™—that was approved under a special new product classification for self-fitting hearing aids. Many industry pundits predict that the FDA’s OTC hearing aid rules will be modeled closely after those rules.
        Regulating OTC hearing aids
        Surprisingly, many DTC hearing aids are registered with the FDA under product classifications that are intended for medical-model hearing aids. If the FDA forces DTC sellers to reclassify their products as OTC (once the new class exists) and requires product clearance (510k), this would mean that many of the FDA-registered hearing aids being sold DTC today may be pulled from the market temporarily.
        This would ultimately be a good thing for consumers. It would mean that consumers would receive an enhanced level of protection from the FDA, as manufacturers would be required to prove the effectiveness and safety of any devices being sold directly to consumers. Without audiologists vetting the products by fitting them on their patients, the FDA has a higher level of responsibility to vet the products before allowing them to be sold on the open market. (My personal opinion)
        Link
    GME AMC
      Knight Ape note
        Hey Adam, I wanted to start by saying that your Rogan Interview was fantastic, seeing the videos posted in the "Ape" communities I'm part of made my day! On that topic, I just wanted to inform John that some of those GameSTOP (John constantly said gamestock) "jackoffs" could very well be knights and donors. As an AMC ape, I am planning on sending you guys some of the profits I make as soon as I realize them and I'm already up quite a bit, pretty close to 6 figures. I've been holding since mid January and I have a pretty good feeling the rest of the apes are going to continue to hold. I believe that all of the "100k per share" price predictions has the psychological effect of making $1000 or $10,000 per share seem more reasonable or attainable which is why so many people have held for so long. As a producer I am making a programming request for your full analysis of the situation as it sounds like you have a really good understanding of it and explaining the DTCC and how hedge funds can operate in dark pools to manipulate the price would be great info for the rest of the NA producers. If this is read on air I hope that other Apes and GME invrstors join me in sending you guys a ton of cash when this all plays out. Thank you for producing the BPITU!
        Sir Ulfgarr, Knight of Orange County
      Wells Fargo is shutting down all lines of personal credit
      Blackstone to buy ESG software provider Sphera in $1.4 bln deal | Reuters
      Lay Down Movement Millennials
        Just wanted to give my two cents on things regarding the lack of motivation following the note from last Sunday’s show. I’m a thirty five year old man who works in a warehouse and the majority of my younger or similarly aged coworkers are VERY lazy. Most spend the day on their phones. My supervisor is only a few years older than me and doesn’t do any sort of delegation and spends more time trying to make sure he’s friends with everyone than actually making sure anyone gets anything done.
        Now all that being said. I think there are HUGE issues with people my age being able to take charge and delegate tasks in a working environment because they’re afraid of coming off “bossy” (I actually believe men my age are far worse at this).
        I believe there is also a lack of “true” upward mobility in companies nowadays and this has played a role in the lack of motivation. Especially when applying or getting a job there’s a promise of a path to success and so on.
        The companies I’ve worked for also have had an insane amount of cronyism and nepotism. The contemporary blue collar work environment is not a meritocracy. Pulling yourself up by your boot straps and going out and doing hard work will not get you the promotion. And I think having that lie drilled into me when I was younger made me very disappointed when I came to find out the truth about “work.”
        -Mike
    Battery Cars
      Aptera- Solar car
    Haiti
      Haitian authorities have asked US military forces to help stabilize the country
      Two 'assassins' who 'helped murder Haitian president' both worked for Miami-based security fir
    CLIP LINKS
      VIDEO - Hal Turner Radio Show - Australia TV Station Reports "TODAY IS THE FIRST FULL DAY OF THE NEW WORLD ORDER" As it reports New Lockdowns
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:45
        Australia TV Station Reports "TODAY IS THE FIRST FULL DAY OF THE NEW WORLD ORDER" As it reports New Lockdowns
        Reporter Steve Hart from the New South Wales TV Station "10 News First" reported to Australian viewers that "Today is the first full day of the New World Order" as he dutifully reported the draconian lockdowns and loss of freedom of a once proud and free citizenry.
        Giving details about the new lockdowns, for the criminal scheme to defraud known as "COVID-19" Reporter Hart, like a good little Commie statist drone, outlined:
        Outdoor Gatherings are limited to: Two People
        Exercise: Within 10km of home
        Browsing in Shops: PROHIBITED
        One (1) Person per household, per day may engage in Essential Shopping (Food and supplies)
        Funerals: Limited to Ten (10) People
        Here, watch the broadcast for yourself:
        Australia is able to do this nonsense to its citizens because it scammed those citizens out of weapons several years ago, with emotion-driven appeals after a single nutcase gunned down some people. The masses never bothered to realize that once they were disarmed, their own government would do things like this. Yet, here it is.
        This is what happens to people who give up their God-given right to own weapons for self-defense.
        It is also what happens when people fail to pay attention to actual facts, and instead drink the Kool-Aid of government propaganda about a disease that has a 99.8% survival rate.
        COVID: A VACCINE SO SAFE YOU HAVE TO BE THREATENED TO TAKE IT, FOR A DISEASE SO DEADLY YOU HAVE TO BE TESTED TO KNOW IF YOU EVEN HAVE IT.
        The whole thing is a deliberate SCAM, perpetrated by power-crazed maniacs, to steal people's freedom through propaganda by HYPING a disease which is no more deadly than a nasty flu season.
        Australians need to rise-up against this or it will never end.
        A Personal Note to Readers from Hal Turner: Many of you have been coming here for awhile, referred by other sites or trusted friends, to read the breaking news and Covert Intel routinely provided by this site. Very frequently, this site leads by hours or even days before mass-media covers a story. It would be a tremendous help to this site, if we could rely on you for ONE DOLLAR per week in support. It's such a trivial amount, you won't even miss it; but it means the world to our existence. Please subscribe to this site for a buck a week, billed quarterly ($13) so this site can have stable revenue and continue bringing you news that actually matters. You'll also get access to hundreds of other stories, an uncensored, free speech, Reader Comments area beneath every story, that can't even be SEEN by the general public, and even be able to hear all the archives of the Hal Turner Radio Show at your leisure! SUBSCRIBE HERE
      VIDEO - (1) "All My Exes CHANGED THEIR SEXES" ðŸ‚ | Buddy Brown | Truck Sessions - YouTube
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:26
      VIDEO - (1) Biden On ISIS: "We Will Follow Them To The Gates Of Hell!" | msnbc - YouTube
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:21
      VIDEO - (1) 'Vaccines won't work': US virologist breaks down COVID-19, how to curb spread - YouTube
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:13
      VIDEO - What the impending rubber 'apocalypse' means for the U.S. economy
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:04
        Rubber is a critical raw material needed for car tires, personal protective equipment such as masks and gloves, and many more everyday products. Anytime you're going anywhere, you're using rubber. Now, supply chain disruptions have thrown the rubber industry into a tailspin.
        "We could be on the cusp of a rubber apocalypse," Ohio State University professor Katrina Cornish told CNBC.
        Rubber producers are facing climate change, the Covid-19 pandemic, a destructive fungus and the fight for shipping containers.
        The global economy remains dependent on Asia for 90% of the natural rubber supply. For example, the U.S. imported $140 million worth of natural rubber in March 2021 alone, according to Census data.
        The global natural rubber market was valued at nearly $40 billion in 2020, and demand for rubber is expected to increase. One analysis predicts the natural rubber market could be worth nearly $68.5 billion by 2026. One reason for the increased demand? Car tires.
        "We are using tires more and more," Stefano Savi, director of the Global Platform for Sustainable Natural Rubber, told CNBC. "The amount of mileage that we're going to do as a global population is definitely bound to increase, and that's why the demand for rubber is really continuing to increase."
        Watch the video above to learn more about why the natural rubber supply chain faces challenges, what natural rubber means for economies around the world, and what rubber innovations may look like in the future.
      VIDEO - Kamala Harris slammed for claiming rural Americans can't photocopy their IDs | Fox News
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        Published July 10, 2021
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        The vice president tried to back her claim by saying rural communities don't have Kinkos or OfficeMaxVice President Kamala Harris was criticized Saturday for arguing against voter ID laws, claiming rural Americans can't get photocopies of their ID's.
        "I don't think that we should underestimate what that [compromise on voter ID laws] could mean," Harris said in an interview with BET News. "Because in some people's mind, that means you're going to have to Xerox or photocopy your ID to send it in to prove who you are. Well, there are a whole lot of people, especially people who live in rural communities, who don't - there's no Kinkos, there's no OfficeMax near them."
        "Of course people have to prove who they are," Harris continued, but "not in a way that makes it almost impossible for them to prove who they are."
        The vice president's comments came in the midst of a nationwide battle over voter ID laws, with states like Georgia and Texas taking center stage. Many progressives argue that voter ID laws are "racist," while Republicans suggest changes in laws are necessary to prevent voter fraud.
        KAMALA HARRIS THROWS PARTY FOR STAFFERS AMID TOXIC WORK ENVIRONMENT FLAP
        Rural Americans took issue with the comments from the vice president '' who spent two recent weekends at her Brentwood mansion in Los Angeles following a brief visit to the U.S.-Mexico border in late June -- suggesting she is out of touch with the nation.
        "We built this country. We can manage to photocopy our ID's," former CIA officer Bryan Dean Wright tweeted.
        Others questioned Harris' comments that people had to prove who they were, but "not in ways that make it impossible to prove who they are."
        "No one is buying this ridiculous argument against Voter ID," tweeted veteran and Pennsylvania Senate candidate Sean Parnell. "The vast majority of Americans support it. Let's get it done."
        Last month, President Biden announced that he tapped Harris to lead the White House's fight to expand access to the ballot box, an issue the vice president told BET News she specifically asked to lead. In the same interview, though, Harris noted that she may have not said "'no' enough" to the multiple assignments from Biden, but that she is used to "multitasking"
        CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
        Polling data from The Associated Press shows that most Americans support laws requiring photo identification to access the ballot box, with a majority of both Republicans and Democrats backing the idea. Overall, 72% of American adults support requiring photo identification to vote.
        Harris' comments came during the BET special titled "State of Our Union: Vice President Kamala Harris" that aired Friday. The interview also touched on coronavirus vaccine rates and police reform.
        Fox News' Marisa Schultz and Houston Keene contributed to this report.
      VIDEO - Aerobic Septic System Maintenance - YouTube
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      VIDEO - Pfizer says it's time for a Covid vaccine booster; FDA and CDC say not so fast - CNN
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 04:05
        (CNN)Drugmaker Pfizer said Thursday it is seeing waning immunity from its coronavirus vaccine and says it is picking up its efforts to develop a booster dose that will protect people from variants.
        Pfizer said it would soon publish data about a third dose of vaccine and submit it to the US Food and Drug Administration, European Medicines Agency and other regulators. The company specified it would seek FDA emergency use authorization for a booster dose in August.
        But in an unusual move, two top federal agencies said Americans don't need boosters yet and said it was not up to companies alone to decide when they might be needed.
        Hours after Pfizer issued its statement, the FDA and Centers for Disease and Control issued a joint statement saying Americans do not need booster shots yet.
        "Americans who have been fully vaccinated do not need a booster shot at this time," they said.
        In a statement to CNN on Friday, the World Health Organization said, "We don't know whether booster vaccines will be needed to maintain protection against COVID-19 until additional data is collected," adding, "limited data available on how long the protection from current doses lasts and whether an additional booster dose would be beneficial and for whom."
        Pfizer and its partner BioNTech said evidence was building that people's immunity starts to wane after they have been vaccinated. The Pfizer vaccine requires two doses to provide full immunity.
        "As seen in real world data released from the Israel Ministry of Health, vaccine efficacy in preventing both infection and symptomatic disease has declined six months post-vaccination, although efficacy in preventing serious illnesses remains high," Pfizer said in a statement emailed to CNN.
        "Additionally, during this period the Delta variant is becoming the dominant variant in Israel as well as many other countries. These findings are consistent with an ongoing analysis from the Companies' Phase 3 study," it added.
        "While protection against severe disease remained high across the full six months, a decline in efficacy against symptomatic disease over time and the continued emergence of variants are expected. Based on the totality of the data they have to date, Pfizer and BioNTech believe that a third dose may be beneficial within 6 to 12 months following the second dose to maintain highest levels of protection." It gave no further details.
        The announcement could have implications across the world. The Pfizer shot is the cornerstone of vaccination programs in many countries. Two-thirds of doses delivered across the European Union were made by Pfizer, according to the European Center. In Israel, Pfizer is the only vaccine used.
        Of the 158 million fully vaccinated people in the US, more than half received the Pfizer shot.
        US government officials have stressed that fully vaccinated people have a low risk of infection, even from the Delta or B.1.617.2 variant, which is more transmissible than earlier lineages of the virus.
        Plus, several studies have indicated the mRNA vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna confer longterm protection.
        "FDA, CDC, and NIH (the National Institutes of Health) are engaged in a science-based, rigorous process to consider whether or when a booster might be necessary. This process takes into account laboratory data, clinical trial data, and cohort data -- which can include data from specific pharmaceutical companies, but does not rely on those data exclusively," they added.
        It was a clear message to Pfizer, which has been hinting at the need for a booster shot for months.
        "We continue to review any new data as it becomes available and will keep the public informed. We are prepared for booster doses if and when the science demonstrates that they are needed," the CDC and FDA said in the statement.
        "The United States is fortunate to have highly effective vaccines that are widely available for those aged 12 and up. People who are fully vaccinated are protected from severe disease and death, including from the variants currently circulating in the country such as Delta," the statement continued.
        "People who are not vaccinated remain at risk. Virtually all COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths are among those who are unvaccinated. We encourage Americans who have not yet been vaccinated to get vaccinated as soon as possible to protect themselves and their community."
        Israel's health ministry said in a statement earlier this week that it had seen efficacy of Pfizer's vaccine drop from more than 90% to about 64% as the B.1.617.2 or Delta variant spread.
        Pfizer said research showed booster doses of its vaccine, developed with BioNTech, produced levels of neutralizing antibodies that are five to 10 times higher than what's produced after two doses.
        It said it's also developing a new formulation for a booster dose that may more thoroughly protect people from new variants.
        "While Pfizer and BioNTech believe a third dose of BNT162b2 has the potential to preserve the highest levels of protective efficacy against all currently known variants including Delta, the companies are remaining vigilant and are developing an updated version of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine that targets the full spike protein of the Delta variant," the company said. Current vaccines target just a piece of the spike protein -- the part of the virus it uses to attach to cells.
        "The first batch of the mRNA for the trial has already been manufactured at BioNTech's facility in Mainz, Germany. The Companies anticipate the clinical studies to begin in August, subject to regulatory approvals."
        CNN's Ivana Kottasov contributed reporting.
      VIDEO - Envy - Where Does The Shit Go? - YouTube
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      VIDEO - FAQ | Aptera_Motors
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        Find out how to reserve Aptera and what makes our company and technology so different.
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      VIDEO - Gov. McKee goes door-to-door in Woonsocket encouraging COVID vaccinations | ABC6
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 03:37
        State and local leaders say they will continue to sponsor these pop-up vaccination clinics all summer across the state. PROVIDENCE, R.I (WLNE) '' If you live in Woonsocket'... you might have heard a knock on Wednesday, and opened your door to find Governor McKee encouraging you to get your COVID-19 vaccine, right then and there!
        ''It's a big day for Woonsocket but Rhode Island in particular,'' McKee said.
        It's all part of a personalized outreach program to promote vaccinations in various cities and towns across Rhode Island with low vaccination rates.
        McKee, joined along with the Rhode Island Department of Health, Woonsocket City Officials, and other various local leaders- focusing specifically on the Morin Heights and Veterans Memorial housing complexes.
        Woonsocket Mayor Lisa Baldelli-Hunt says it's crucial to get vaccination numbers up in these areas.
        ''Families living in multi-generational tight, quarters'... where if someone is COVID positive it's more likely than not they are going to pass it onto their other family members,'' Baldelli-Hunt said on Wednesday.
        According to the Department of Health, a total of 46 individuals were vaccinated at two pop-up clinics set up at Morin Heights and Bourdon Blvd.
        Woonsocket has the lowest vaccination rate to date in Rhode Island of all other cities and towns.
        State and local leaders say they will continue to sponsor these pop-up vaccination clinics all summer across the state.
        Anthony Silva, Chief of Staff to Governor Dan McKee, says other areas of concern for low vaccination rates are some zip codes in Newport and Pawtucket.
        No health insurance or ID is required for the vaccinations.
        For more information on local clinics near you, please click here for more information.
        (C)WLNE-TV/ABC6 2021
      VIDEO - Boston Pride Is Dissolving Group After Inclusion Complaints - YouTube
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      VIDEO - Infinite - Official Trailer (2021) Mark Wahlberg, Chiwetel Ejiofor - YouTube
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      VIDEO - Japan Threatens China with WAR over Taiwan - YouTube
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      VIDEO - Xinhua Commentary: Why U.S. politicians so convinced by "lab leak" theory? - YouTube
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      VIDEO - (135) Joe Biden 'rewriting history, yet again': Panahi - YouTube
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:44
      VIDEO - ð'‡ð'ð'ð'‰8 ð'ð'‰ð'ð'‰ on Twitter: "NSW ðŸ‡­ðŸ‡² Wow, so Brazen now. Listen to thisðŸ‘‡ Channel 10 tonight, discussing the Sydney Lockdown conditions. Listen as he says, "Today is the First Full Day of The NEW WORLD ORDER" Please don't
        Link to Article
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 22:41
        ð'‡ð'ð'ð'‰8 ð'ð'‰ð'ð'‰ : NSW ðŸ‡­ðŸ‡² Wow, so Brazen now. Listen to thisðŸ‘‡ Channel 10 tonight, discussing the Sydney Lockdown conditions. Listen as'... https://t.co/oTsbAgT1rG
        Sat Jul 10 09:06:16 +0000 2021
        Angelakg : @ATLEASTDIETRYN @husserl80 They need to be destroyed they spoke of NWO FOR DECADES.
        Sat Jul 10 21:00:25 +0000 2021
        Su downunder : @ATLEASTDIETRYN And what happens now is up to everyone to OBEY. Don't blame these traitors for the end of our freed'... https://t.co/FXSRxoeKtt
        Sat Jul 10 19:55:30 +0000 2021
        Watchmanfor2020 : @ATLEASTDIETRYN Like I always say convid 1984 was used as a perfect smoke screen to start the new world order
        Sat Jul 10 18:06:59 +0000 2021
      VIDEO - What the impending rubber 'apocalypse' means for the U.S. economy
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 13:59
        Published Fri, Jul 9 2021 12:56 PM EDT
        A Facebook iconShare by facebookA Twitter iconShare by twitterA LinkedIn iconShare by linkedinAn email iconShare by email
        Rubber is a critical raw material needed for car tires, personal protective equipment such as masks and gloves, and many more everyday products. Anytime you're going anywhere, you're using rubber. Now, supply chain disruptions have thrown the rubber industry into a tailspin.
        "We could be on the cusp of a rubber apocalypse," Ohio State University professor Katrina Cornish told CNBC.
        Rubber producers are facing climate change, the Covid-19 pandemic, a destructive fungus and the fight for shipping containers.
        The global economy remains dependent on Asia for 90% of the natural rubber supply. For example, the U.S. imported $140 million worth of natural rubber in March 2021 alone, according to Census data.
        The global natural rubber market was valued at nearly $40 billion in 2020, and demand for rubber is expected to increase. One analysis predicts the natural rubber market could be worth nearly $68.5 billion by 2026. One reason for the increased demand? Car tires.
        "We are using tires more and more," Stefano Savi, director of the Global Platform for Sustainable Natural Rubber, told CNBC. "The amount of mileage that we're going to do as a global population is definitely bound to increase, and that's why the demand for rubber is really continuing to increase."
        Watch the video above to learn more about why the natural rubber supply chain faces challenges, what natural rubber means for economies around the world, and what rubber innovations may look like in the future.
        View the full site
      VIDEO - ID&T oprichters naar de rechter. ''De maat is vol'' zeggen Duncan en Lisca Stutterheim'... - YouTube
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        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 23:41
      VIDEO - WARNING: A Future US Digital Currency Might Give the FED the Power to Approve Your Mortgage Based on Factors Other than Credit Worthiness
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        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 16:34
        The US and almost all countries are moving towards the implementation of digital currencies. With this comes concerns related to privacy and government and political overreach and discrimination.The below discussion with George Gammon addresses concerns about the government dictating who can get loans and at what rates.
        Just imagine the next time you go to get a mortgage for your home. You wouldn't go down to your local Wells Fargo branch, you would go directly to Jerome Powell. Right, and they would determine whether or not you get that loan and what the interest rate would be and therefore they can control the amount of dollars in the system.
        Another reason this is so important for people to understand is right now the amount of lending in the system is constrained by the amount of individuals or entities in the system that can actually pay back the loans. Right, commercial banks are constrained by a profit and loss. The FED is not contained by a profit and loss. So they wouldn't have to use a credit score, as an example, to determine who gets a loan and who doesn't get a loan and at what interest rate. They could use a social score like we're kind of seeing in China.
        TRENDING: BREAKING: Wicked Michigan AG Is Using State Police to Go After Those Who Made "False Claims" About 2020 Election Fraud
        Similar actions could take place with groups being discriminated against. Imagine if a governor in a state approves a bill that he or she believes will help their state but the bill conflicts with what the federal government wants. Those controlling currency could penalize members of that state in reaction to the bill being passed.
        This is an excellent video discussing the possibilities and concerns with a future with digital currencies.
        The brave new world has possibilities good and bad that need to be discussed in the public square so Americans' freedoms are not left unprotected.
      VIDEO - Jack Posobiec ðŸ‡ºðŸ‡¸ on Twitter: "BREAKING: Kash Patel confirms the Trump Admin was trying to deploy the National Guard for Jan 6 but were blocked https://t.co/Db2s0HoBuv" / Twitter
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        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 13:28
        Jack Posobiec ðŸ‡ºðŸ‡¸ : BREAKING: Kash Patel confirms the Trump Admin was trying to deploy the National Guard for Jan 6 but were blocked https://t.co/Db2s0HoBuv
        Thu Jul 08 11:39:59 +0000 2021
      VIDEO - Darren of Plymouth ðŸ‡¬ðŸ‡§ on Twitter: ""Vaccinated people are more likely to get coronavirus" Grant Shapps https://t.co/nSFc3fE6H5" / Twitter
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        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 13:11
        Darren of Plymouth ðŸ‡¬ðŸ‡§ : "Vaccinated people are more likely to get coronavirus" Grant Shapps https://t.co/nSFc3fE6H5
        Fri Jul 09 09:05:11 +0000 2021
        UTG : @DarrenPlymouth Wtf!!!
        Fri Jul 09 13:09:08 +0000 2021
        WhatsNext? : @DarrenPlymouth Say what ??
        Fri Jul 09 13:02:26 +0000 2021
        Yezzzsir : @DarrenPlymouth From his own mouth!
        Fri Jul 09 13:02:10 +0000 2021
        scylla'‚ ãƒ'ãƒƒãƒã‚"ã‚¤ãƒ" : @DarrenPlymouth https://t.co/xw7b6jwW7K
        Fri Jul 09 13:02:06 +0000 2021
        Ricardo Seijas : @DarrenPlymouth Link to the original clip?
        Fri Jul 09 13:00:06 +0000 2021
      VIDEO - Bloomberg Quicktake on Twitter: "WHO's @DrTedros: "The fact that millions of health and care workers have still not been vaccinated is abhorrent" https://t.co/BGpoYR086o" / Twitter
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        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 10:13
        Bloomberg Quicktake : WHO's @DrTedros: "The fact that millions of health and care workers have still not been vaccinated is abhorrent" https://t.co/BGpoYR086o
        Fri Jul 09 09:09:06 +0000 2021
      VIDEO - (122) Huge explosion erupts on ship at Jebel Ali port, sending shockwaves through Dubai | WION World News - YouTube
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    STORIES
      Surgeon who operated on young Italian vaccine victim: 'You have never seen anything like this'
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 13:04
        The surgeon who operated on an Italian girl, Camilla Canepa, who died at the age of 18 from the effects of the vaccine, said he has never seen anything like this. "It's not normal," he added.
        Camilla Canepa was operated on by Gianluigi Zona, director of the neurosurgical and neuro-traumatological clinic of the San Martino hospital: ''I had never seen a brain that was affected by such an extensive and severe thrombosis.''
        The neurosurgeon on duty in San Martino that night was Alessandro d'Andrea, who also called the chief physician to his side at the operating table. ''We decided to have a decompression craniotomy, in which the skull is opened to relieve internal pressure.''
        Zona recounted the experience: ''All venous sinuses were blocked with thrombi, a scenario I have never seen in my many years in this profession. Think of the venous sinus as the river in the middle of a valley where several streams converge. If a dam is built in the middle of the watercourse, the river swells and the tributaries can no longer drain at this point, so that the pressure rises upstream.
        ''I'm neither a virologist, nor an epidemiologist, nor a coroner, but given the image I saw in the girl's head, it is clear that we are dealing with something that is not normal.''
        The parents of the 18-year-old who died, told the media: ''She had no disease.'' Last week, the prosecutor of Genoa, which coordinates the ongoing investigations, will instruct the Pavia coroner to perform the autopsy on the body of Camilla Canepa, the eighteen year old who died after the vaccine. The girl allegedly suffered from chronic platelet deficiency, a ''familial autoimmune thrombocytopenia''. This is what investigators have learned from the first reports of the doctors.
        But the girl's family, assisted by the lawyer Angelo Paone, is firm on this point. ''Camilla had no disease,'' explained their lawyer. Supporting their claim, are two different CT scans. She had undergone the two scans, and was discharged after the first one that had not shown the situation of the thrombosis in progress, but immediately transferred to the hospital after the second showing that her health had been compromised.
        The girl arrived in the emergency room in the Lavagna hospital on June 3, just a week after the AstraZeneca shot. She had complained of severe headaches.
        Canepa, who was from the town of Sestri Levante in Liguria, was given the jab during a vaccination ''open day'' for youths over 18. The AstraZeneca jab has been approved for all over-18s, but in Italy it is only recommended for over-60s due to links to several cases of blood clots in younger people.
        Camilla's case has raised concerns among young people previously keen to get vaccinated to obtain the Green Pass or vaccine passport enabling them to travel and attend mass events.
        All rights reserved. You have permission to quote freely from the articles provided that the source (www.freewestmedia.com) is given. Photos may not be used without our consent.
        Help us to produce more articles like this. FreeWestMedia is depending on donations from our readers to keep going. With your help, we expose the mainstream fake news agenda.
      Naming the Capitol Cop Who Killed Unarmed Jan. 6 Rioter Ashli Babbitt | RealClearInvestigations
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:39
        At top, pistol drawn in the House chamber, a plainclothes black officer who fits the description of Michael L. Byrd. His name was apparently divulged at a hearing as the cop who shot Ashli Babbitt.By Paul Sperry, RealClearInvestigationsJuly 7, 2021Most police departments '-- including Washington, D.C.'s Metropolitan Police '-- are required to release an officer's name within days of a fatal shooting. Not the U.S. Capitol Police, which is controlled by Congress and answers only to Congress. It can keep the public in the dark about the identity and investigation of an officer involved in a shooting indefinitely.Which is what happened with the Jan. 6 shooting of Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed protester in the U.S. Capitol riot who was fatally wounded by a plainclothes police lieutenant as she attempted to breach a set of doors inside the building.
        Video shot at the riot shows the Capitol officer in a hall outside the House chamber carefully advancing (at around 34:55), aiming ...
        YouTube/Jayden X
        ... and then shooting, hitting Babbitt, above, as she tried to climb through a smashed window, Trump flag on her back. The fatal gunshot blew her backward.
        YouTube/National File
        For the past six months, as Congress has proposed legislation to reform police departments across the country, the Capitol Police has stiff-armed government watchdogs, journalists and even lawyers for Babbitt, who have sought the identity of the officer and additional details about the shooting. The USCP still refuses to release his name, in stark contrast to recent high-profile police shootings around the nation.In February, USCP issued a press release promising to ''share additional information once the investigation is complete.'' But Justice Department investigators closed their probe in April, clearing the officer of criminal wrongdoing in Babbitt's death, which the medical examiner ruled a homicide. And last month, the D.C. Police '-- which shares jurisdiction with the Capitol Police and has led the investigation into Babbitt's shooting '-- concluded its own internal review of the shooting without making any findings, according to spokeswoman Kristen Metzger.Still, USCP continues ''stonewalling the public," according to the head of the police union.
        ''That's my department's attorneys for you,'' United States Capitol Police Labor Committee Chairman Gus Papathanasiou told RealClearInvestigations. ''There is definitely a transparency issue. The department needs to answer those questions. They are stonewalling the public.''Withholding the name of the officer who fired the fatal shot '-- the only round fired by anyone during the four-hour siege '-- has bred speculation on the Internet and led to the mistaken identification of at least one officer. USCP Special Agent David Bailey was wrongly fingered as the shooter on social media and conservative news sites.
        After RCI called attention to the false rumor in an email to USCP, followed by a story on the issue, USCP's communications chief officially knocked it down as ''misinformation.''
        Lt. Byrd was investigated for leaving his department-issued Glock-22 firearm unattended in a Capitol restroom. A Glock-22 was used in the Babbitt shooting.
        Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg News
        Now a new name has surfaced in the Babbitt imbroglio '-- Lt. Michael L. Byrd '-- and while USCP Communications Director Eva Malecki won't confirm he is the shooter, in this case she isn't denying it.In a little-noticed exchange, Byrd was cited by the acting House sergeant at arms during a brief discussion of the officer who shot Babbitt at a Feb. 25 House hearing. Both C-SPAN and CNN removed his name from transcripts, but CQ Transcripts '-- which, according to its website, provides ''the complete word from Capitol Hill; exactly as it was spoken'' '-- recorded the Capitol official, Timothy Blodgett, referring to the cop as ''Officer Byrd.'' His name is clearly audible in the videotape of the hearing (see video embed further below).
        Byrd appears to match the description of the shooter, who video footage shows is an African American dressed that day in a business suit. Jewelry, including a beaded bracelet and lapel pin, also match up with photos of Byrd.
        In addition, Byrd's resume lines up with what is known about the experience and position of the officer involved in the shooting '-- a veteran USCP officer who holds the rank of lieutenant and is the commander of the House Chamber Section of the Capitol Police.
        Following the shooting, Byrd's Internet footprint was scrubbed, including his social media and personal photos.
        ''Officer Byrd'' is named in a videotape of House testimony (around 39:20).Phone calls and emails to Byrd, who lives in Maryland where he remains on paid administrative leave, went unanswered. His attorney would neither confirm nor deny that the 53-year-old Byrd is the shooter, and warned that disclosing his name poses a safety risk to the officer.
        The Babbitt family is frustrated USCP won't release any information about the incident other than the terse and vaguely written statement it issued on Jan. 7: ''[A] sworn USCP employee discharged their service weapon, striking an adult female.''Because Congress has exempted the USCP from Freedom of Information Act requests, the family is suing the D.C. Police ''for documents that identify the officer who shot Babbitt ... as well as notes and summaries of what the officer said regarding the shooting and the reasons he discharged his weapon.'' (The D.C. Police has led the investigation into Babbitt's shooting.) A hearing before a judge is scheduled for Sept. 3. Washington-based watchdog Judicial Watch also is suing for the records.
        Aaron and Ashli Babbitt, from "Justice for Ashli Babbitt" on Twitter (@ForAshli.) Aaron Babbitt plans a wrongful-death lawsuit over her killing.
        ''They sit back and they completely refuse to release the name of their own police officer that was involved in a shooting of an unarmed woman,'' said Ashli Babbitt's husband, Aaron. "It's ridiculous, it's absolutely ridiculous.''
        Babbitt has hired a Maryland lawyer specializing in police-abuse cases who plans to file a wrongful-death lawsuit against USCP and the officer, seeking at least $10 million in damages.
        The attorney, Terry Roberts, said he has received no information from USCP about the case, even though he contacted the department's general counsel in May. But he said an investigator in his office has positively identified the shooter from a ''painstaking'' analysis of photos and videos taken by journalists and witnesses inside the Capitol, as well as from tips from citizens and other information.He said a key witness is Taylor Hansen, a freelance journalist who films protests around the country and was outside the Speaker's Lobby with Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Force veteran, when she was shot. Hansen claims to have identified Byrd as the officer who opened fired on Babbitt, striking her in the lower left shoulder.
        "Hansen was present when Ashli was shot,'' Roberts told RCI. "He has spoken with my investigator. He provided a reliable and accurate account of what he saw; he also made a video recording, which proved useful."
        Roberts said he is not ready to name the officer as a defendant in the lawsuit until he meets federal regulations for filing personal-injury claims against government agencies and employees, which could take several more weeks. However, he told RCI, ''He's a guy who left his service revolver in a bathroom.''
        From "Justice for Ashli Babbitt" on Twitter. Slain in the U.S. Capitol at 35, she was an Air Force veteran.
        In February 2019, Lt. Byrd was investigated for leaving his department-issued Glock-22 firearm unattended in a restroom on the House side of the Capitol, even though the potent weapon, which fires .40-caliber rounds, has no manual safety to prevent unintended firing. Fortunately, the abandoned gun was discovered by another officer during a routine security sweep. A Glock-22 was used in the Babbitt shooting.Byrd addressed the blunder at a roll call the following morning, reportedly telling fellow officers that he would ''be treated differently'' because of his rank as a lieutenant.
        At the time, Malecki assured the press that ''appropriate actions will be taken'' against Byrd. Asked recently what disciplinary actions were administered, the USCP spokeswoman declined comment.
        Unlike other police forces, USCP does not have to disclose records on police misconduct.
        More than 700 complaints were lodged against Capitol Police officers between 2017 and 2019, but brass won't say what the alleged violations were or how the department resolved them. They also won't disclose how many complaints are in any individual officer's file.
        While the USCP has an inspector general, he does not make reports public, unlike other agency watchdogs. His report on Jan. 6 remains secret.Critics say the 193-year-old agency is in dire need of reform. They point out that even the Secret Service complies with FOIA requests and releases reports and audits by its internal watchdog. The Capitol Police, in contrast, won't even reveal how many sworn officers it has on hand.
        ''Unlike the [D.C. Police] and the vast majority of local police forces, the USCP provides little public information about its activities,'' complained Daniel Schuman, policy director of the D.C. watchdog group Demand Progress, in a recent letter to the heads of the congressional panels who have oversight authority over USCP.
        D.C. law requires police to identify the officer involved in a police shooting within five business days after an officer-involved death or serious use of force. Officials must publicly release the names and body-camera recordings of all officers involved in the death or use of force. The law does not cover the Capitol Police, however, even though D.C. Police work in conjunction with that agency on homicide cases and fatal traffic accidents.
        The Babbitt shooting has thrust this double standard into the national spotlight.
        Some lawmakers on the USCP oversight committees are clamoring for changes, starting with the immediate release of the name of the officer who shot Babbitt. They allege that Capitol Police are protecting an officer who killed an unarmed citizen from public scrutiny.
        ''In many instances, when a law enforcement officer kills an individual for any reason, that officer's name is publicly released. But not in the case of Ashli Babbitt,'' said GOP Rep. Paul Gosar, who sits on the House Oversight Committee. ''Instead, there is a determined effort to cover up the full circumstances of this homicide.''
        Mark Schamel, the Washington attorney defending the officer, warned that revealing his client's name could put his life in jeopardy. He said the officer has received ''credible" death threats and has gone into hiding. He would not provide further details about the type of threats or whether they have been reported to the FBI. Schamel also declined to say if authorities have provided the officer a protective security detail.
        Asked about any threats made against Byrd, USCP General Counsel Tad DiBiase told RCI in an email that "one of our officers has received death threats, threats to his family, and numerous vile, racist sentiments directed at the officer." Without elaborating, he said "these threats are currently under active investigation by the USCP and the FBI."
        The only publicly known threat made against the officer who shot Babbitt came from Garret Miller, who was arrested in Texas in part because of threats he made two weeks after participating in the Capitol riot. However, Miller circulated the wrong photos of the officer on Facebook, falsely identifying Officer Bailey, who is also African American. Miller remains in federal custody.
        The FBI and USCP declined to answer when asked if any threats have been directed against Lt. Byrd specifically.
      Vaccination rewards haven't provided big boost for Nevada | Las Vegas Review-Journal
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:37
        Gov. Steve Sisolak's offer of a chance to win a million-dollar prize hasn't resulted in a noticeable uptick in COVID-19 vaccinations in Nevada, at least not so far.
        Sisolak announced a state raffle on June 17 in which vaccinated residents could win a total of $5 million in prizes, including college tuition and a $1 million grand prize. The rewards were intended to boost the state's declining numbers of new vaccinations.
        Brian Labus, an assistant professor of epidemiology and biostasticis at UNLV's School of Public Health, said the offer didn't immediately result in big gains.
        ''There wasn't a giant spike in people vaccinated the next day,'' he said when asked to review vaccination data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Through Friday, the seven-day daily average of first doses administered also appeared to continue its downward trend.
        A chance at big prizes ''may help slow that trend,'' said Labus, who has served as a member of the governor's medical advisory team on COVID-19, ''but it may not be visible as a single spike or something like that.''
        He also cautioned that one week of data is insufficient to form a conclusion.
        North Carolina State University Professor Julie Swann had a similar take.
        ''I do not see clear evidence yet that the demand increased June 17th or afterward,'' Swann, department head of industrial and systems engineering, said in an email. ''It is difficult to say that it didn't, because it is possible the demand would have declined without the announcement of the lottery.
        ''There is also still time for demand to increase, and there could be an additional bump in demand after the first drawing,'' said Swann, a former adviser to the CDC.
        The first of eight weekly drawings in Nevada is set for July 8.
        Chasing 'cash at the end of the rainbow'
        On Wednesday, Sisolak said it was too soon to assess the raffle's impact, though he'd heard anecdotally that some people were getting a shot because of ''cash at the end of the rainbow.''
        And with every additional shot, ''We're doing more to protect our state and protect our residents,'' the governor said.
        As in other parts of the country, COVID-19 vaccinations have been declining in Nevada since peaking in the spring.
        The seven-day daily average of first doses administered in the week following the governor's announcement numbered nearly 3,100, less than previous weeks in June, CDC data indicates.
        That number could increase if there were lags in reporting vaccinations. Vaccinators are allowed from 24 to 72 hours to record vaccinations in the Nevada WebIZ system that tracks vaccinations, said Shannon Litz, a representative of the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services.
        The week before the governor's announcement, average daily first doses numbered about 4,800. The two previous weeks saw about 3,600 and 4,700 vaccinations, respectively.
        Fifty-two percent of Nevada's 12-and-older residents who are eligible for vaccine has gotten at least one dose.
        ''Vaccination numbers have remained steady and every shot administered is one more Nevadan protected from this virus,'' Litz said of the raffle's impact. ''We are encouraged to see there is continued interest in vaccination and believe the governor's announcement of Vax Nevada Days will keep the spotlight on the importance of getting vaccinated.
        ''We're grateful to everyone who has decided to be vaccinated to protect the health of our communities and continue to encourage Nevadans to learn about the vaccines, get their questions answered and make a plan to be vaccinated when they are ready.''
        Following the lead of Ohio, states across the country have begun to offer vaccination lotteries or raffles to bolster their vaccination rates. These efforts come at a time when the Delta variant of the coronavirus, which spreads more easily and may result in more serious illness, appears to be becoming the dominant strain in the U.S.
        Ohio saw an immediate spike in vaccinations following the announcement of its lottery on May 13. The impact of lotteries in other states remains less clear.
        No prize needed
        Half a dozen people trickling into a Las Vegas vaccination site late Thursday afternoon said they had not heard of the state's raffle.
        Michelle McAteer, 54, said she got a shot without an incentive.
        ''There wasn't any incentive outside of not dying,'' she said with a chuckle.
        ''I wanted to get back to normal, and I wanted to not get sick and die because I already have asthma,'' said McAteer, who was getting a shot at a vaccination clinic at Garside Junior High, on Torrey Pines Drive south of U.S. Highway 95.
        Still, she was glad to hear that she would be automatically entered in the raffle.
        ''I'm always happy to win anything,'' she said.
        The Southern Nevada Health District's Stephanie Ruiz said she was seeing many parents at the clinic who were getting their children vaccinated to protect them before they returned to the classroom. Only a few people mentioned they hoped to win a prize in the raffle.
        After getting a shot at the Garside clinic, Luciana Arbila, 18, said she needed to get vaccinated before studying in Spain in the fall. Her cousin, Maria Lucia Pulido, also 18, said she got a shot because she wanted life to return to normal after missing out on graduation and prom, and after the death of her grandfather from COVID-19.
        The cousins had not heard of the raffle. Nor, as it turns out, are they eligible to win a prize.
        Only Nevada residents can win prizes in the raffle. The cousins, who live in Colombia, were in Las Vegas visiting another cousin, they said.
        People getting vaccinated aren't required to show identification and aren't required to be residents, according to Southern Nevada Health District representative Jennifer Sizemore.
        However, Nevada residency will be verified before raffle winners are announced, state officials said.
        The Colombian cousins said their age group was not yet eligible for vaccination in their home country, so they opted to get their shots here. Few countries have the luxury of plentiful vaccine '-- or a need to offer enticements.
        Pulido said she was OK with not having a chance at a prize.
        ''Our main objective wasn't to win,'' she said. ''We're not that disappointed.''
        Vaccination information can be found at nvcovidfighter.org.
        Contact Mary Hynes at mhynes@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0336. Follow @MaryHynes1 on Twitter. Review-Journal staff writer Michael Scott Davidson contributed to this report.
      Wells Fargo is shutting down all lines of personal credit - CNET
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:23
        Getty Images Wells Fargo told customers that it plans to shutter all lines of personal credit in the coming weeks, CNBC reported on Thursday. The bank reportedly sent a letter to customers saying it'll no longer offer the lines of credit, which range from $3,000 to $100,000 and serve to help fund things like home repairs and renovations or to consolidate credit card debt .
        The bank's letter to customers warned that account closures "may have an impact on your credit score," according to CNBC. Current customers should expect to receive 60 days' notice of the account closures and remaining balances will need to be paid off with minimum payments at a fixed rate.
        Read more: Wells Fargo is closing your personal line of credit account. Here's what happens next
        "As we simplify our product offerings, we made the decision last year to no longer offer personal lines of credit as we feel we can better meet the borrowing needs of our customers through credit card and personal loan products," a Wells Fargo spokesperson said.
        "We realize change can be inconvenient, especially when customer credit may be impacted. We are providing a 60-day notice period with a series of reminders before closure, and are committed to helping each customer find a credit solution that fits their needs."
        Read more: Best checking account for July 2021
        A direct deposit of news and advice to help you make the smartest decisions with your money.
      Biden to Sign Order on OTC Hearing Aids
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 12:16
        Today, The White House Briefing Room announced a new executive order aimed at promoting competition in the American economy. In the order, the President directs HHS "to consider issuing proposed rules" for over-the-counter (OTC) hearing aids "within 120 days".
        Today's historic Executive Order established a whole-of-government effort to promote competition in the American economy. The Order includes 72 initiatives by more than a dozen federal agencies to promptly tackle some of the most pressing competition problems across our economy.
        Among the 72 initiatives, the executive order includes mandates to lower prescription drug prices, ban and limit non-compete agreements and occupational licensing requirements, ban excessive early termination fees for internet service, and make it easier to switch banks. Also included is the long neglected matter of OTC hearing aids:
        In the Order, the President: Directs HHS to consider issuing proposed rules within 120 days for allowing hearing aids to be sold over the counter.
        A push to break up anti-competitive marketsThe Biden administration argues that "fewer large players have controlled more of the market" in areas like "prescription drugs, hearing aids, and internet service". The administration also predicts that OTC hearing aids will "save Americans with hearing loss thousands of dollars by allowing hearing aids to be sold over the counter at drug stores".
        A major driver of the expense is that consumers must get them from a doctor or a specialist, even though experts agree that medical evaluation is not necessary. Rather, this requirement serves only as red tape and a barrier to more companies selling hearing aids. The four largest hearing aid manufacturers now control 84% of the market.
        Will OTC hearing aids make hearing aids more accessible?The marketplace for direct-to-consumer (DTC) hearing aids is alive and well. One can go to Google, search for ''buy online FDA registered hearing aid'', and see a myriad of options, with and without remote support from a licensed practitioner. In other words, the market is highly unregulated, and access to alternative products without the ''red tape'' is already possible. In fact, the pandemic ushered in an era of growth for companies like Eargo, a publicly-traded company that sells DTC hearing aids online.
        At the same time, the wildly successful Apple AirPods Pro already provide hearing-aid-like features like personalized amplification, background noise reduction, and (coming soon) hyper-directional beamforming microphones. While limited in their amplification capabilities, the AirPods Pro cost $249 or less (when on sale), and the market is predicted to be in the hundreds of millions (units sold).
        And Bose recently launched an FDA-approved DTC hearing aid'--the Bose SoundControl''--that was approved under a special new product classification for self-fitting hearing aids. Many industry pundits predict that the FDA's OTC hearing aid rules will be modeled closely after those rules.
        Regulating OTC hearing aidsSurprisingly, many DTC hearing aids are registered with the FDA under product classifications that are intended for medical-model hearing aids. If the FDA forces DTC sellers to reclassify their products as OTC (once the new class exists) and requires product clearance (510k), this would mean that many of the FDA-registered hearing aids being sold DTC today may be pulled from the market temporarily.
        This would ultimately be a good thing for consumers. It would mean that consumers would receive an enhanced level of protection from the FDA, as manufacturers would be required to prove the effectiveness and safety of any devices being sold directly to consumers. Without audiologists vetting the products by fitting them on their patients, the FDA has a higher level of responsibility to vet the products before allowing them to be sold on the open market. (My personal opinion)
        Does the announcement change the timeline?In August 2017, President Trump signed the Over the Counter Hearing Aid Act, which authorized the direct sale of hearing aids without medical referrals or prescriptions. The act gave the FDA until August 18, 2020 to publish regulations for the new product category, but the FDA missed the deadline and has repeatedly delayed meeting to discuss the matter.
        The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) recently published its official Spring 2021 Unified Agenda, which included tentative plans for the FDA to address OTC hearing aids in 2021. This isn't the first time the FDA has planned to work on the rules'--this is the fifth time the rulemaking session has been scheduled'--but today's announcement does seem to indicate that there is a higher likelihood of the session actually occurring.
        When reached for comment, Kate Carr, Hearing Industries Association (HIA) President, said ''once the draft is released, we anticipate a public comment period, followed by further FDA review. It could take up to nine months or more for the final regulation to be released.'' She also shared the following graphic, which helps illustrate FDA's rulemaking timeline:
        Hearing aid stocks down on the newsThe share price for the largest medical-model hearing aid manufacturer on the planet, Sonova, was down sharply (~7%) following the announcement. Other large players were down too: Demant A/S was down ~9%, and GN was down ~6%. Eargo's stock was also down.
        Good Morning America coverageGood Morning America (GMA) covered the new mandate from the Biden Administration this morning. The GMA exclusive asks whether the executive order will provide ''new help for millions who need hearing aids''.
        Follow Hearing Tracker to stay up to dateFor continued coverage of OTC hearing aids, please subscribe to our newsletter. We will continue to follow the story, and will provide updates to our readers.
      The Hunter Biden Laptop Is Real - WSJ
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 11:47
        The problem isn't Hunter Biden '--it's Joe'--as major media outlets may be discovering, sort of, with the White House's absurd intervention in the younger Mr. Biden's latest career as a budding Van Gogh.
        In fact, the intervention smells like a scheme dreamed up by Hunter himself, designed to call attention to his connection to the president, advertise it and enable it, while pretending to do the opposite.
        For details, see a long account on the front page of Friday's Washington Post. Under the plan, a New York gallery will keep secret the identities of those paying up to $500,000 for his novice pieces, but of course this wouldn't stop the buyer from letting Hunter know who just bought his art or from turning up later as Hunter's guest at a White House event.
        All of this is magnificently obvious on its own terms, but even more so in light of the ludicrously detailed, well-documented revelations from the Hunter Biden laptop published over the last nine months by the New York Post and Britain's Daily Mail.
        To avoid knowing the truth so you don't have to report it is not good reporting. This has been the approach of other media, or was until last month when the Washington Post's resident ''fact checker,'' Glenn Kessler, in a hilariously neurotic piece, apparently forced on him only because of his previous swallowing of Biden denials, finally confirmed some of the New York Post's reporting.
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        To wit, the vice president made an ''unscheduled'' stop at a private restaurant dinner in April 2015 where Hunter was hosting an official of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma. Understand: If Hunter's role on Burisma's board was to make the company a hot potato for Ukrainian corruption investigators, the vice president's stop-by succeeded instantly in turning the administration's Ukraine policy into a hostage to Burisma avoiding prosecution.
        Mr. Kessler writes a sentence that would fascinate Dr. Freud: ''When we looked into it, there was less to the story than one might imagine.'' He never specifies who ''one'' is or what one ''imagines,'' but the Washington Post confirms the New York Post story in toto.
        Let the dam break. The New York tabloid's reporting, and that of the Daily Mail, which also has the laptop data, is everything journalism aspires to be, based on transparently obtained, contemporaneous documentation, not on somebody's after-the-fact recollection or spin. Their reporting makes the average Bob Woodward book look like the product of ouija-board reporting.
        Mr. Kessler and others use the excuse that the tabloids won't share the laptop data, as if they should surrender their scoops to their haughtier brethren. But as Mr. Kessler demonstrates, other outlets are perfectly free to follow up by going to sources and asking questions, seeking documents. Watergate would not have unraveled if other papers didn't follow up, and sometimes correct, the Washington Post's revelations. Good places to start would be evidence of Mr. Biden's lending the trappings of the vice presidency to Hunter's effort to curry favor with Mexican billionaires Carlos Slim and Miguel Alemn Velasco, or of Hunter's use of his business income to pay his father's personal phone and home-improvement bills.
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        Other news outlets are not obliged to adopt the tabloids' framing. They can interpret the pattern as Washington complexities as usual or as Mr. Biden's indulgence of a particularly troubled son. But ignoring a story you know to be true in hopes your readers will believe it's not true is not the job our ''newspapers of record'' signed up for.
        All this takes on a sicklier coloration when you recall how the media coverup started: when 50 former intelligence officials, led by Obama administration veterans, claimed the laptop story had ''all the earmarks of Russian disinformation.'' They had no evidence and, worse, were prostituting their professional judgment. To create a plausible fake laptop, with a plausible index of files, plausible time stamps, plausible browser history, thousands of plausible photos, text messages, emails and other documents would be beyond the Kremlin and laughably disproportionate to any aim the Kremlin might hope to achieve.
        The intelligence officials knew it. They were lying to the American public to influence an election. It's hard to imagine a Ben Bradlee or Abe Rosenthal being party to this, or trying to pretend the laptop doesn't exist. It's hard to imagine them sitting still for the government's stonewalling over the shooting of Ashli Babbitt or the death of Officer Brian Sicknick or the dubious Russian intelligence that remains the open secret of the FBI's chaotic intervention in the 2016 election.
        Much excellent reporting is still done by our big-time news organizations but can you trust them when you know they are also hiding news from you? Once you did not start from the presumption that members of the press were conformist lickspittles. Now you are stuck with the default presumption that they probably are.
      F.D.A. Seeks Investigation of Its Own Alzheimer's Drug Approval - The New York Times
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 11:46
        Health | F.D.A. Seeks Investigation of Its Own Alzheimer's Drug Approval https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/09/health/aduhelm-alzheimers-fda-investigation.htmlThe agency's acting head said a review should look into whether any interactions between agency staff and the drug developer, Biogen, broke F.D.A. rules.
        The acting commissioner of the F.D.A. said some interactions between the agency and Biogen, the developer of Aduhelm, ''may have occurred outside of the formal correspondence process.'' Credit... Cj Gunther/EPA July 9, 2021
        The Food and Drug Administration on Friday called for a federal investigation of the process that led to the approval of a new drug for Alzheimer's disease that has spurred sharp criticism from lawmakers and the medical community.
        In a letter to the Department of Health and Human Services' independent Office of the Inspector General, the F.D.A.'s acting commissioner, Dr. Janet Woodcock, acknowledged the scrutiny the agency has faced about the approval process for the drug, which is known as Aduhelm and has a $56,000 annual price tag. She pointed to interactions between representatives from the drug's developer, Biogen, and the agency, saying some ''may have occurred outside of the formal correspondence process.''
        ''To the extent these concerns could undermine the public's confidence in F.D.A.'s decision, I believe it is critical that the events at issue be reviewed by an independent body,'' Dr. Woodcock wrote. She noted that the review should look at whether any of the communication between the agency's staff and Biogen's representatives violated F.D.A. rules.
        Dana Conti, a spokesman for Biogen, said the company ''will, of course, cooperate with any inquiry in connection with a possible review of the regulatory process.''
        It is unusual for the agency to request an investigation into its own staff's decision-making process for an individual drug approval. The move is likely to intensify the controversy that has surrounded Aduhelm. The F.D.A. approved it a month ago, overriding the fierce objections of its own independent advisers and many other scientists, who said there was insufficient evidence to know whether the drug was effective.
        New Drug Approved: The F.D.A. approved the first new Alzheimer's treatment in 18 years, and the first to attack the disease process.Does New Drug Work?: Patient groups are desperate for new options, while several prominent Alzheimer's experts and the F.D.A.'s own independent advisory committee objected to its approval, having raised concerns over lack of sufficient evidence of its effectiveness.Understand Alzheimer's Disease: Get answers to common questions about the disease, which affects about 30 million people globally.One Face of Alzheimer's: This profile of a woman in the early stages of the disease shows what it can be like to face the beginning symptoms and to consider the future.On Thursday, the F.D.A. moved to narrow its recommendation about who should receive the drug. After originally recommending it for all Alzheimer's patients, the agency's new guidelines say it should be prescribed only to people with mild cognitive problems.
        Dr. Aaron Kesselheim, one of three experts who quit an F.D.A. advisory panel last month in protest of the agency's decision on Aduhelm, said he welcomed the call for a federal investigation.
        ''It's really important that an investigation happen publicly and quickly so that we find answers to some of the many outstanding questions swirling around this decision,'' said Dr. Kesselheim, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital.
        A number of Alzheimer's and public health experts have raised concerns about what they characterized as an unusually close collaborative relationship between Biogen and the F.D.A. while the drug was being reviewed. One example was the agency's move to jointly present with Biogen its glowing review of the evidence supporting the drug in a meeting of the F.D.A.'s independent advisers in November 2019.
        Stat, the medical news organization, first reported that in early May 2019, Dr. Billy Dunn, the head of the agency's neuroscience division, held an off-the-book meeting with a Biogen executive, Dr. Al Sandrock. While it is not unusual for drug company executives to meet frequently with F.D.A. officials, it is unusual to present data that would be part of an F.D.A. application outside a formal setting.
        A few months earlier, Biogen had moved to halt two late-stage studies of Aduhelm after an early analysis found that it would not prove to be effective. But Biogen researchers analyzing the data soon concluded that the decision to halt the studies had been premature and that they had reason to believe it might be effective after all.
        The May 2019 meeting between Dr. Dunn and Dr. Sandrock was an initial step in restarting the talks that led to last month's approval. It led to the first of a series of standard formal meetings between Biogen and agency staff. It also led to a more unusual collaboration: That summer, representatives from the company and the agency worked closely together to sort through Biogen's complicated data from the studies, communicating nearly every day, Stat reported.
        Aduhelm was the first drug approved to treat Alzheimer's in 18 years '-- and it was the very first approval for a drug designed to attack the biological underpinnings of the disease, instead of just delaying symptoms.
      Saudi Arabia funds digital news platform in U.S., lobbies White House
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 11:43
        Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammad bin Salman attends the 14th Islamic summit of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Mecca, Saudi Arabia June 1, 2019.
        Waleed Ali | Reuters
        Saudi Arabia is funding a yet-to-be-announced digital news platform, which will have a studio in Washington, D.C., as the kingdom begins a new lobbying effort aimed at the White House and Congress.
        The new effort, which had yet to be reported, is being backed by a subsidiary of the Saudi Technology Development and Investment Co., or Taqnia, according to new foreign lobbying disclosures filed with the Department of Justice.
        Journalists and presenters involved in the project have past experience at Fox News, Al Jazeera, NBC and SiriusXM satellite radio.
        The creation of what one of the documents calls a "news platform" comes as the kingdom has started hiring a new team of lobbyists as the Saudis seek access to President Joe Biden's administration and the new Congress.
        It also arrives almost three years after the death of Washington Post journalist and Saudi royal family critic Jamal Khashoggi. A recent U.S. intelligence report says Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approved an operation to capture or kill Khashoggi.
        Biden, however, opted not to punish the crown prince for his alleged role in Khashoggi's death.
        "We held accountable all the people in that organization '-- but not the crown prince, because we have never that I'm aware of, when we have an alliance with a country, gone to the acting head of state and punished that person and ostracized him," Biden said in a recent interview with ABC News.
        The subsidiary backing the initiative is Taqnia ETS, a company that focuses on engineering and technological services for Saudi Arabia.
        PitchBook says Taqnia is based in Saudi Arabia, which "prefers to invest in the life sciences and health, security and defense, information and communication technology, material sciences, energy and environment and water technology sectors."
        Taqnia's website says it is owned by the kingdom's over $400 billion Public Investment Fund, or PIF, the country's massive sovereign wealth fund that's meant to invest into projects and help boost Saudi Arabia's economy. The lobbying disclosure report says Taqnia ETS is "supervised and financed by the Saudi Ministry of Information."
        The PIF's executive board includes members of the royal family such as the crown prince.
        The lobbying documents give a glimpse into the upcoming Saudi-led news venture.
        One of the lobbying disclosures shows that a company called Prime Time Media is helping lead the effort. Prime Time Media's CEO, Elie Nakouzi, is assisting in the creation of the new digital news organization. His company is getting paid at least $1.6 million, the document shows, to help guide the project.
        The purchase order included in the lobbying disclosure describes the work being done by Prime Time Media as "English content for news platform." More than $75,000 has already been spent on equipment, freelancers and a Washington, D.C., studio, the documents say.
        The lobbying filings were signed by Nakouzi last month and the purchase order included with the disclosure is dated September 2020. The order form is marked by Taqnia ETS' logo.
        One of the documents listing Nakouzi says Prime Time Media will "assist client in the video production of English news content. In doing so, registrant will not participate in the dissemination of said news content."
        Nakouzi, who, according to the disclosure, has citizenship in Lebanon but resides in the United States, has a history of working in Middle East media circles. While working for an Arabic television network, Nakouzi interviewed then President George W. Bush during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
        Nakouzi confirmed to CNBC in an email several aspects of Taqnia's project, including that it will be a new online platform and that a studio has been created. He declined to comment further on the news content of the upcoming site and referred all questions to Taqnia who did not respond to CNBC's request for comment.
        "Taqnia plans to launch an international online platform before the end of this year," Nakouzi said in an email Tuesday. "As for the Studio, we have built a fully equipped virtual green room for future use," he added while noting that it will be based in Washington.
        "Prime Time Media is not entitled to speak on their behalf. We are a video production house and we don't do lobbying or PR services," Nakouzi said.
        Eric Ham and Craig Boswell, two U.S.-based journalists, will be anchoring online shows for the Saudi-funded venture. Both Ham and Boswell have so far been paid $6,000 each for what's described on the disclosure reports as being writers and presenters.
        "Mr. Eric Ham and Mr. Craig Boswell will be hosting online shows that are still in production phase," Nakouzi said in the email.
        Boswell and Ham did not return requests for comment before publication.
      Haiti's wounded first lady rips 'gutless' killers
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 11:36
        News
        By Eileen AJ Connelly
        July 10, 2021 | 11:27pm
        Martine Mo¯se spoke out about her husband's killers. Dieu Nalio Chery/AP
        The hospitalized wife of Haiti's assassinated President Jovenel Mo¯se Saturday accused her husband's enemies of wanting ''to kill his dream, his vision, his ideology.''
        ''I'm alive, thanks to God,'' Martine Mo¯se, 47, said in her first reported statement since the Wednesday raid, in which she was shot multiple times.
        ''But I love my husband, Jovenel. We fought together for more than 25 years. During all these years, love radiated within the home. But suddenly, the mercenaries came and pelted my husband with bullets.
        ''You have to be a notorious criminal without guts to assassinate a president like Jovenel Mo¯se with impunity, without giving him the chance to speak,'' she added in a recording made at a Miami hospital, where she is being treated.
        ''You knew who the president was fighting against.''
        Haitian citizens gather in front of the US Embassy in Tabarre, Haiti on July 10, 2021, asking for asylum after the assassination of President Jovenel Mo¯se. AFP via Getty ImagesWhile The Associated Press reported that the statement was released by Martine Mo¯se, The Haitian Times, an English language news outlet based in Brooklyn, claimed the tape was a ''deep fake.''
        It said the voice in the audio was different from previous recordings of the first lady, and that her Twitter account, where the recording was posted, was hacked.
        The statement came as Haiti was reeling in the aftermath of the killing, and shortly after a third politician claimed to be the country's leader.
        Joseph Lambert (center) has also claimed power in Haiti. AFP via Getty ImagesJoseph Lambert, who leads what remains of the Haitian Senate, announced that he was voted provisional president by his fellow senators Friday evening.
        But the vote took place among just 10 senators, as the rest of the 30-member chamber left office in January. Since Haiti has yet to hold new elections, those members were never replaced.
        Lambert joined two others seeking to rule the nation since Mo¯se, 53, was killed.
        Claude Joseph, who had resigned as prime minister, took charge of the government and named himself acting president in the hours after the assassination. Ariel Henry, whom Mo¯se had named prime minister but had not yet taken office, also claims he should be in charge.
        Members of the Haitian police stand guard outside of the presidential residence on July 7, 2021. AFP via Getty ImagesThe US and the UN have recognized Joseph, who on Friday asked both bodies to deploy troops to Haiti. While the streets are quiet, the fear of violence is widespread.
        A senior US official told Reuters there were ''no plans to provide US military assistance at this time.''
        More than a dozen former members of Colombia's military were arrested for the pre-dawn attack that killed Mo¯se and injured his wife. At least two were killed in a shootout. Two Haitian-Americans were also arrested, although they have claimed they were only translators in an interview with a judge.
      'How is it even possible?' Russia asks OPCW after report claims team was sent to Germany the same day Navalny fell ill in Siberia '-- RT Russia & Former Soviet Union
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 11:19
        The latest OPCW report containing data on its response to the 'poisoning' of Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny has glaring inconsistencies, Moscow says, adding that the chemical weapons watchdog has failed to explain them.
        Russia will seek clarification from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) on its findings, the country's envoy to the chemical weapons watchdog Aleksandr Shulgin has announced. The document, presented at the 97th session of the organization's executive council earlier this week, contains information on the body's reaction to Navalny's poisoning back in August 2020.
        Also on rt.com Russia calls upon OPCW to release data on Navalny 'poisoning' to all member states; says Germany failing to provide answers In it, the OPCW states that its secretariat ''deployed a team to perform a technical assistance visit'' related to the suspected poisoning of a ''Russian citizen'' at Germany's request on August 20. The problem is that on that day, Navalny was only flying from the Russian Siberian city of Tomsk to Moscow. It was on that flight that he first felt ill and was then rushed to a hospital in another Siberian city, Omsk, following the plane's emergency landing.
        Russia demanded that the OPCW explain ''how this is even possible'' and why the organization had previously told the participating states that its team was only sent to Germany in early September, Shulgin said.
        So, what do we have here? When Navalny first felt unwell while still onboard a flight from Tomsk to Moscow, the OPCW experts were already waiting for him in Berlin?
        According to the Russian envoy to the OPCW, the technical secretariat of the chemical weapons watchdog has so far failed to provide any answer to these questions. According to Shulgin, Russia has ''lots of questions'' for the OPCW and will seek ''clear answers'' to every last one.
        The revelations also elicited a reaction from the Russian Foreign Ministry's spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova. She said the glaring inconsistencies in the OPCW report only show that some Western nations, together with Navalny himself, are ''going down'' with their whole ''chemical weapons poisoning story.''
        Instead of answering Russia's questions, the OPCW executive committee session saw another ''drama'' about Navalny's ''supposed poisoning with a chemical weapon agent,'' Shulgin said. ''Routine anti-Russian theses have become a 'must' for the NATO nations at any OPCW event,'' he added.
        Also on rt.com OPCW says it found traces of Novichok-class substance in blood & urine samples of Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny After falling ill on a flight from Tomsk to Moscow, Navalny was hospitalized in Omsk and placed in a coma on August 20. The doctors in Omsk found no traces of any specific chemical agents in his body and concluded that his condition had been caused by a metabolic disorder.
        Two days later, following a request from his associates and his family, Navalny was flown to Berlin's Charite clinic. On August 24, German doctors said that the results of clinical studies indicated he had been poisoned with a cholinesterase inhibitor.
        The OPCW has also now said that ''biomarkers of the cholinesterase inhibitor'' were found in the blood and urine samples taken from Navalny that were sent to its laboratories.
        Navalny spent more than a month being treated in Berlin and has since repeatedly claimed that Kremlin ''ordered'' his poisoning. Meanwhile, a report published in British medical journal The Lancet suggested that it was the actions of the Russian doctors in Omsk that might have played a key role in saving the opposition figure's life.
        Russian President Vladimir Putin also revealed back in October 2020 that he personally asked Russian prosecutors to let Navalny travel to Germany. The opposition figure was under travel restrictions at that time due to a suspended sentence.
        Berlin then also repeatedly stated that Navalny was poisoned with a 'Novichok-like' substance '' a reference to the infamous chemical agent supposedly used to poison former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the UK in 2018.
        While authorities in the European Union's most powerful member state cited evidence obtained by the German military as well as analysis from two laboratories in France and Sweden, Moscow has repeatedly pointed to the fact that Berlin never presented any material evidence of Navalny's poisoning, and did not share any findings with Russian officials. This is despite at least four formal cooperation requests from the Russian Prosecutor General's Office.
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      Haiti's president killed by 'foreign hit squad' of ex-Colombian military & Haitian-Americans, 11 arrested inside 'Taiwan embassy' '-- RT World News
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 04:00
        Haiti's national police force has claimed that two Americans and 26 Colombians were responsible for the assassination of President Jovenel Moise, while Taiwan has confirmed that 11 arrests were made at its diplomatic compound.
        At least 28 people carried out the murder plot earlier this week, police chief Leon Charles told reporters on Thursday, noting that several suspects were brought into custody, while others were killed in firefights with authorities.
        ''We have arrested 15 Colombians and the two Americans of Haitian origin. Three Colombians have been killed while eight others are on the loose,'' Charles said, adding that police had recovered ''weapons and materials used by the assailants.'' Rifles, machetes and other tools that were seized were displayed on a table near the police chief.
        We will strengthen our investigation and search techniques to intercept the other eight mercenaries.
        Also on rt.com Multiple gunmen killed & arrested in firefight with suspected assassins of Haitian President Jovenel Moise Colombian Defense Minister Diego Molano also said on Thursday that early findings suggest that several former members of his country's armed forces took part in the operation. He vowed to support Haitian authorities in their probe.
        Later in the evening, Taiwan's diplomatic compound in Haiti said that 11 ''mercenaries'' had been arrested on the facility's grounds, but did not elaborate beyond stating that the police operation ''went smoothly.'' The nationalities of those suspects remain unknown.
        Haiti is among a small handful of nations to recognize and keep formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan, which Beijing considers to be a province of China proper.
        The US State Department told Reuters it could not confirm whether American citizens had been arrested, but said it is in contact with Haitian officials to determine the next steps. The island's elections minister, Mathias Pierre, identified the two Haitian-Americans as James Solages, 35, and Joseph Vincent, 55.
        Moise was fatally shot by a group of gunmen at his home near the capital of Port-au-Prince early on Wednesday morning, with his wife also seriously wounded and airlifted to Miami, Florida for treatment. Few details about the attackers have emerged, though interim Prime Minister and acting President Claude Joseph previously claimed that they spoke both Spanish and English and may have posed as American Drug Enforcement Administration agents.
        Also on rt.com 'State of siege': Haitian PM declares nationwide state of emergency following president's assassination Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!
      Navy picks Mercury Systems to provide airborne electronic warfare (EW) technology to confuse enemy radar | Military Aerospace
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      How the American South is paying the price for Europe's 'green' energy
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        By Majlie de Puy Kamp, CNNPhotographs by Will Lanzoni, CNN
        Video by Matthew Gannon, Demetrius Pipkin & Nick Scott, CNN Published July 9, 2021 A ndrea Macklin never turns off his TV. It's the only way to drown out the noise from the wood mill bordering his backyard, the jackhammer sound of the plant piercing his walls and windows. The 18-wheelers carrying logs rumble by less than 100 feet from his house, all day and night, shaking it as if an earthquake has taken over this tranquil corner of North Carolina. He's been wearing masks since long before the coronavirus pandemic, just to keep the dust out of his lungs.
        Some nights, he only sleeps for two or three hours. Breathing is a chore.
        ''I haven't had proper rest since they've been here,'' he said.
        That was eight years ago, when the world's largest biomass producer, Enviva, opened its second North Carolina facility just west of Macklin's property in Garysburg. The operation takes mostly hardwood trees and spits out biomass, or wood pellets, a highly processed and compressed wood product burned to generate energy. Enviva is one of nearly a dozen similar companies benefiting from a sustainability commitment made 4,000 miles away, more than a decade ago.
        'It's like we don't matter': Green energy loophole has devastating impact on communityIn 2009, the European Union (EU) pledged to curb greenhouse gas emissions, urging its member states to shift from fossil fuels to renewables. In its Renewable Energy Directive (RED), the EU classified biomass as a renewable energy source '-- on par with wind and solar power. As a result, the directive prompted state governments to incentivize energy providers to burn biomass instead of coal '-- and drove up demand for wood.
        So much so that the American South emerged as Europe's primary source of biomass imports.
        Earlier this year, the EU was celebrated in headlines across the world when renewable energy surpassed the use of fossil fuels on the continent for the first time in history.
        But scientists and experts say it's too early to celebrate, arguing that relying on biomass for energy has a punishing impact not only on the environment, but also on marginalized communities '-- perpetuating decades of environmental racism in predominantly Black communities like Northampton County, where Macklin and his family have lived for generations.
        Macklin's elderly aunt lives right behind him, a tall Magnolia tree provides shade to both their homes. His mother's house is just down the street. They used to have large family cookouts in his garden while the kids played on the lawn, but they haven't done that in years. Between the noise and the sawdust from the plant, his home is no longer a safe place to gather.
        But it's the pollution that worries him most.
        ''You don't know what's coming out of the smokestack,'' said Macklin. ''That's my main concern.''
        T o say cutting down trees and burning them for power is a renewable energy source feels counterintuitive and, in reality, it is.
        Burning wood is less efficient than burning coal and releases far more carbon into the atmosphere, according to almost 800 scientists who wrote a 2018 letter to the European parliament, pushing members to amend the current directive ''to avoid expansive harm to the world's forests and the acceleration of climate change.'' President Joe Biden and other world leaders received a similar letter from hundreds of climate scientists earlier this year.
        The EU directive that encouraged the pivot to biomass also left a loophole '-- it did not prevent the leveling of rooted trees for wood pellet production.
        ''I can't think of anything that harms nature more than cutting down trees and burning them,'' said William Moomaw, professor emeritus of international environmental policy at Tufts University.
        Yet by burning wood, European power plants can reduce their carbon footprint '-- at least on paper.
        The American Southeast is the largest wood-producing region in the world.In 1996, scientists at the United Nations devised a method to measure global carbon emissions. To simplify the process and avoid double counting, they suggested emissions from burning biomass should be calculated where the trees are cut down, not where the wood pellets are burned.
        The EU adopted this methodology in its Renewable Energy Directive, allowing energy companies to burn biomass produced in the US without having to report the emissions.
        The accounting method '-- which was never intended to assign national responsibility for carbon emissions, according to climate experts '-- has created a lot of discussion and disagreement among advocates, scientists and policymakers. But ultimately it is not the accounting of carbon that is the problem, it's the emissions.
        ''It doesn't change the physical reality,'' said Tim Searchinger, senior research scholar at Princeton University. ''A law designed to reduce emissions that in reality encourages an increase in emissions '... has to be flawed,'' he said, referring to Europe's directive.
        Ultimately, Europe is not reducing emissions by burning American trees '-- it's just outsourcing them to the United States.
        ''The idea was to curb our addiction to fossil fuels,'' said Bas Eickhout, Dutch politician and member of the European Parliament. Biomass was an attractive option for EU countries at the time, he explained, because it was much cheaper than solar or wind power and could be ''mixed in'' when burning coal.
        However, European decision-makers didn't fully consider the repercussions of importing biomass, Eickhout said, adding they ''were too na¯ve.''
        ''The production of biomass has become an industrial process which means something has gone fundamentally wrong,'' he said. ''The professionalization of the biomass industry is a problem that needs attention.''
        T he directive led to troubling consequences across the Atlantic. By failing to restrict biomass to the byproduct from manufacturing paper, furniture or lumber, Europe created a strong incentive to cut down whole trees and turn them into wood pellets.
        Encouraged by government subsidies, European power plants began importing biomass from the largest wood producing region in the world: the American Southeast.
        North Carolina has been ''ground zero'' for the wood pellet industry, said Danna Smith, co-founder and executive director of the environmental advocacy group Dogwood Alliance. One hundred and sixty-four acres of the state's forests are cut down by the biomass industry every day, according to an analysis by Key-Log Economics.
        Enviva owns four wood pellet plants in North Carolina, including this one in Northampton County.US-based Enviva, which owns four wood pellet plants in North Carolina, says their product is fighting climate change.
        ''When sourced responsibly wood-based biomass is recognized by the leading international organizations and scientists as climate friendly, renewable and carbon-neutral energy source,'' Enviva wrote in a statement, adding that they require the forests they source from ''will regenerate, either naturally or through planting.''
        Yet, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change '-- the UN body that came up with the carbon accounting methodology '-- states its guidelines ''do not automatically consider or assume biomass used for energy as 'carbon neutral,' even in cases where the biomass is thought to be produced sustainably.''
        Trees are harvested at a logging operation in Northampton County.And, North Carolina's Clean Energy Plan notes that biomass ''does not advance (the state's) clean energy economy.'' The plan goes on to acknowledge that most of the wood pellets produced in the state are exported to Europe, and even that ''the science regarding carbon neutrality and accounting methods are contentious issues.''
        Biomass is renewable only in the sense that trees can grow back, said Grant Domke, who leads a team researching and reporting on carbon stocks and changes on forest land at the US Forest Service. ''But that is different than it being carbon-neutral.'' When it comes to Europe reducing carbon emissions by burning American biomass, ''the math doesn't add up.''
        Still, the biomass industry is not showing any signs of slowing down. Drax, a British company that operates the largest UK power plant, has acquired several wood pellet plants in the American South and is developing others. Enviva, too, is building new facilities and is expanding existing ones '-- including the plant in Northampton County, North Carolina, where Macklin and his family live.
        I t's here where once grand country homes stand dilapidated, overrun with weeds and abandoned in a jigsaw puzzle of cotton, grain and sprawling pine plantations. Strip malls, restaurant chains and expansive parking lots comprise the commercial landscape. Gas stations line the roads but grocery stores are few and far between. The temperature was already scorching in May '-- residents kept their curtains drawn and many stayed inside, the hum of air conditioning providing the only sign of life.
        For the last decade, the population in Northampton County has been declining and, despite a clear need for health care, there was only one primary care physician serving the entire county, with a population of just under 20,000, in 2018.
        Northampton County
        Enviva plants
        NORTH CAROLINA
        Median household income
        Percent Black population
        $43,000
        $51,000
        $61,000
        6%
        16%
        26%
        42%
        Sources: US Census 2019 5-year American Community Survey, North Carolina Dept. of Environmental Quality
        Enviva plants
        NORTH CAROLINA
        Median household income
        $43,000
        $51,000
        $61,000
        Northampton County
        Percent Black population
        6%
        16%
        26%
        42%
        Sources: US Census 2019 5-year American Community Survey, North Carolina Dept. of Environmental Quality
        Enviva plants
        NORTH CAROLINA
        Median household income
        $43,000
        $51,000
        $61,000
        Northampton County
        Percent Black population
        6%
        16%
        26%
        42%
        Sources: US Census 2019 5-year American Community Survey, North Carolina Dept. of Environmental Quality
        That same year, a health assessment by the county health department asked residents if they had ever been diagnosed with certain ailments. The report showed more than 60% of the participants said they had high blood pressure, more than half said they were overweight and over 20% said they suffered from depression or diabetes. Nearly 11% of residents said they had heart disease.
        The latest data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showed that more than one in 10 adults in Northampton had asthma in 2018. Asthma hospitalizations in the county, however, are lower than in the state as a whole, according to the NC Department of Environmental Quality.
        Macklin, a father of two and lifelong Northampton resident, is living these statistics. Two years ago, the 44-year-old's heart condition worsened, requiring him to quit his job at a meat packaging plant and leaving him with a disability, like more than 16% of county residents under 65.
        Andrea Macklin wipes dust off of his car. He says he has to wash his car frequently because of the dust coming from the Enviva plant behind his house.Macklin's wife and 21-year-old son both suffer from asthma, a condition that Macklin said is exacerbated by the pollution and dust coming from Enviva's plant behind his house. Since the plant started operating, he said, his wife and son can't spend more than five minutes outside without coughing.
        Before Enviva opened its Northampton mill, the 551 square miles that make up the county were already home to three major air pollution sources '-- facilities required to a request a permit under Title V of the Clean Air Act for emitting large amounts of air pollutants. Another three such facilities are located within two miles of the Northampton border in neighboring Halifax County.
        In 2013, Enviva became the fourth Title V permit holder in Northampton County, emitting tons of dangerous fine particles, or PM2.5, carbon monoxide and a number of what the Environmental Protection Agency calls ''Hazardous Air Pollutants'' '-- including formaldehyde and methanol.
        ''All of our plants operate in compliance with their permits and federal and state prescribed emission legal standards under the permits, presenting no risk or issue to public health or environment,'' Enviva said in a statement, adding that a state air quality monitor five miles from its facility found that PM2.5 levels did not ''present a health risk'' to county residents.
        Yet federal standards for fine particulate matter are too high and do not protect public health, according to twenty scientists who served on an EPA panel on particulate matter in 2018 and urged the administration to impose tougher pollution standards.
        The EPA did not take action at the time but announced last month it is taking another look at the federal standards for PM2.5 saying ''scientific evidence and technical information indicate that the current standards may not be adequate to protect public health and welfare, as required by the Clean Air Act.''
        Exposure to year-round PM2.5 pollution '-- particles at least 20 times thinner than a strand of human hair '-- has been linked to asthma and slowed lung function in children and increased risk of cancer, heart attacks, strokes and death from cardiovascular disease, according to the EPA. The health problems in Macklin's community have not been directly linked to the Title V facilities in the county.
        The population of Northampton '-- which, according to CNN's analysis, has one of the highest numbers of major air polluters per capita in the state '-- is predominantly Black, underscoring long-standing concerns over environmental racism.
        The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, the agency tasked with granting air quality permits in the state, declined to comment for this story.
        Belinda Joyner lives in Northampton County. The county's population is predominantly Black.''We've been disrespected all our lives,'' said resident Belinda Joyner, 68, who has been fighting environmental racism in her community for decades, ''and we're still being disrespected.''
        PM2.5 polluters in the United States ''disproportionately and systemically affect people of color,'' according to a recent study that noted this type of exposure is responsible for up to 200,000 excess deaths in the United States every year.
        When there is ''degradation of the air and the land, we simultaneously see degradation of the community,'' said Smith, of the Dogwood Alliance.
        A ll but one of Enviva's nine operating plants in the country are located in communities that have higher percentage of Black residents than their states as a whole, according to a CNN analysis of census tract data from the American Community Survey. The only exception was the company's plant in southeast Georgia.
        In addition, all of Enviva's plants are in census tracts that have lower median household incomes than their states, and eight of the nine '-- all except the one in southern Virginia '-- are in tracts with higher poverty rates than their states as a whole.
        To some, like Macklin, Enviva's presence has hardly benefitted the community.
        ''They just feel like they come in and do what they want to do,'' said Macklin, adding later, ''All the noise and the dust and stuff, it was never like that, it's always been quiet around here '... that plant is on 24 hours a day. It don't stop. Seven days a week.''
        Kathy Claiborne, 59, who lives on the other side of the Enviva plant in Northampton, anticipates the sleepless nights by trying to take a nap when she gets home from work. The noise is worst around 2 a.m., she said.
        ''I never really thought about noise as being a health hazard until I talked to the communities that live next to the Enviva facilities and they say they can't sleep at night,'' said Smith. ''Not being able to sleep is depriving people of one of the most important foundations of human health.''
        Enviva's Northampton plant glows against the night sky. Nearby residents say noise from the plant is the worst overnight.In its response to CNN, Enviva said the company takes ''environmental justice concerns raised with respect to our operations very seriously. And, we work closely in our communities and community leaders to ensure our operations bring both positive economic and environmental impact.'' The company also said it had not received noise complaints other than ''generic complaints'' at a recent hearing raised by ''the same activists we've heard from before.''
        Enviva pointed to an environmental justice analysis for its operations in Northampton done by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, claiming the report ensures ''there is no negative impact on disadvantaged or minority communities from out plants or operations.''
        However, the 2019 Environmental Justice Impact Statement merely describes the demographics around the plant '-- noting high disability and poverty rates in a majority Black population '-- it does not give recommendations or reach conclusions about the impact the industry would have on the community.
        Still, in June, the county Chamber of Commerce awarded Enviva with the ''Corporate Business of the Year'' award '-- noting the company ''continuously supported, donated, and invested their time and talents into local organizations and causes.''
        Though the relationship between local officials and Enviva is ''good now,'' inviting them in had drawbacks, said Franklin Williams, the county's economic development director. The company wants to be ''good partners,'' he said, applauding its outreach efforts and noting that Enviva has provided school supplies to local schools and helped sponsor food banks in the community during the pandemic.
        Joyner and the Claibornes recalled a Christmas when Enviva sent some residents hams '-- but the outreach felt almost insulting.
        ''The next thing you know that plant is up and running and we're getting a ham,'' said Claiborne's husband, Earl. ''It was a good gesture but you know you're getting pulled into something.''
        To Joyner, school supplies and holiday meals do little to counter the impacts Enviva's operation has had on the people of Northampton. This is where her mother bought the land that her house sits on '-- it's where she raised her two daughters.
        ''All I want to do is take care of it,'' she said. ''I don't have the privilege to get up and move. Where am I going? This is home.''
        J ust across the border in Virginia '-- less than an hour from Joyner's house '-- sits a rare, protected ancient wetland forest.
        ''We're looking at trees around us that are over a thousand years old,'' said Smith, as she maneuvered her kayak through the Cypress trees, pointing out different species and identifying birds whose habitats are threatened by industrial logging. It's an ''incredible jewel of an ecosystem,'' she said.
        It's a humbling place, in stark contrast with the hot and dusty clear-cuts '-- land where trees have been leveled and not replaced '-- and rows of newly planted pine trees that make up Macklin and Joyner's neighborhood.
        Cypress trees, some with trunks wider than a sedan, stand tall between lily pads and beaver dams. In the winter, the water rises and hides those massive, cracked and often hollow tree trunks that are visible in the warmer months. Noise from the nearby highway is drowned out by an orchestra of birds. Fish jump out of the water as if in an animated film. It's peaceful, green and surprisingly cool on an otherwise sweltering summer day.
        The 535-acre forest '-- surrounded by hundreds of thousands of acres of pine plantations and clear-cuts '-- is a precious needle in a haystack.
        Danna Smith is the co-founder and executive director of environmental advocacy group Dogwood Alliance.''The forestry industry and the wood pellet industry says that trees are renewable,'' said Smith, but ''we aren't renewing thousand-year-old ecosystems. They're renewing forests for commercial production. So you'll see trees on the landscape that are maybe, you know, 30 years old. That's not an ecosystem '-- that's a fiber farm.''
        As long as trees are replanted, Enviva and supporters of the biomass industry argue, burning them can be considered renewable energy. But the reality is not so simple.
        When trees are cut down and burned, all the carbon they stored is immediately emitted into the air, Moomaw, the professor at Tufts University, explained. For a new tree to grow and re-absorb the same amount of carbon takes decades '-- making the worldwide attempts at going carbon neutral on deadline, like the EU wants to by 2050, a daunting goal.
        At best, planting a seedling for every downed tree keeps carbon emissions neutral over time '-- it's not removing any more carbon out of the atmosphere, Moomaw stressed.
        ''It's preventing us from getting worse, but it's not making it better,'' he said.
        A Cypress tree rises out of the water in a wetland forest in Courtland, Virginia.Or, as Smith put it ominously, ''we're losing decades of time every time forests are clear cut '-- time we don't have.''
        Traveling back to Northampton from the protected Cypress wetlands, Smith points out clear cuts along the way. A 50-acre plot of decades-old trees cleared in the fall still bore the smell of pine '-- serving a jarring image less than an hour from the lush wetland forest to the east.
        Enviva received 15% of those once living, standing trees '-- deemed ''lower-value wood'' by the biomass industry because it doesn't meet the specifications for lumber.
        ''This is our nation's sacrifice zone for unsustainable consumption of wood products and products we don't need,'' Smith said. ''These wood pellets aren't even producing electricity here '... this is completely unnecessary.''
        T homas Garner has been logging '-- cutting down trees and loading them onto trucks '-- since he was 16 years old. He remembers pulling logs onto his back and loading the trucks by hand. Big machines '-- aptly called log loaders '-- have made his work much easier, but even at 83 he drives fully stocked 18-wheelers to wood and paper mills all over Northampton County and beyond.
        Enviva has been good for his business as an independent contractor, he said, a sentiment echoed by others who spoke to CNN.
        But the jobs come at a hefty price for Northampton County.
        Local officials eager to pull Northampton out of its Tier One status '-- a designation by the state for its 40 lowest ranking counties in terms of economic well-being '-- lured companies, including Enviva, to the area with financial incentives. But these incentives actually set Northampton back, said Williams, the current Director of Economic Development in the county.
        Thomas Garner has been logging since he was 16 years old and says Enviva has been good for his business.In Enviva's case, among the conditions the company agreed to was the creation of 62 full-time jobs, Williams said, adding that in return, Northampton County would pay the company $360,556.70 each year, in addition to 120 acres of land and upwards half a million dollars toward water, sewer and gas lines among other support.
        But instead of boosting the economy out of the lowest tier, the five-year agreement was among the drivers of higher property taxes in the community.
        ''I think they over-incentivized their efforts to get these businesses here and it caused the tax rate to go up in order to meet the budget,'' said Williams.
        Between 2011 and 2019, the property tax rate in Northampton County increased nearly 6%. The county has had the third highest property tax rate in the state for the past five years.
        It's a burden many residents can't shoulder.
        Cut logs sit on a truck in Northampton County.Northampton has one of the highest unemployment rates in the state '-- which almost doubled during the Covid-19 pandemic '-- and nearly 22% of its residents are living in poverty.
        ''If the wood products industry and biomass were a way of growing strong rural economies in the southeastern region, these rural communities should be some of the wealthiest on the planet,'' said Smith. ''We are in the world's largest wood producing region. But you don't see any evidence in these rural communities of thriving rural economies. The opposite is actually true.''
        Enviva currently employs 98 people at their Northampton facility and pay roughly 37% more than the average wage in the county, the company told CNN in a statement, adding that they strive to hire locally if workers have the right qualifications.
        The salary is one of the reasons that even Macklin applied for jobs at Enviva, most recently about two years ago. He said he worked in wood mills before and had hoped for a job close to home, but he never heard back from the company. Macklin, who recently had major heart surgery, said he won't apply again out of concern for his health.
        ''I wouldn't want to be around all that dust,'' Macklin said. ''I don't want to be inhaling it.''
        O n a hot Wednesday morning at the end of May, Joyner and fellow community activist Richie Harding, drove an hour and a half to Raleigh to protest against the wood pellet industry and deliver a petition to the governor's office, asking him to keep future biomass operations out of North Carolina.
        At a news conference, Joyner stressed that her community was a ''dumping ground'' for industries that nobody else wants to live near.
        Harding, another lifelong Northampton County resident, called out what he perceives to be environmental racism targeting his hometown: ''If Black lives matter, why is my community the desired location for a facility that would not only shorten my life, but the lives of my children?''
        Despite wide-ranging arguments against biomass, Enviva has received more than $7 million in subsidies since 2013 from federal, state and local agencies to produce wood pellets for export to Europe.
        Throughout the South, the biomass industry continues to grow. Twelve new plants across six states, including two proposed Enviva facilities in Alabama and Mississippi, have requested permits, according to data from the Southern Environmental Law Center. Existing plants, like the Enviva operation in Northampton, are expanding.
        A log loader moves freshly cut trees in Northampton County.The EU, which aims to be climate-neutral by 2050, is set to revise its Renewable Energy Directive this summer and is expected to update sustainability criteria for biomass. Critics hope they will restrict biomass imports from overseas, exclude whole, living trees as ''waste product'' and properly account for carbon emissions from cutting and burning wood.
        But a draft document that surfaced this past spring does not suggest substantial changes are coming for Europe's directive.
        None of the options offered will address the two main problems with biomass: burning wood for energy is worse than burning coal, and cutting down trees ''profoundly damages ecosystems and biodiversity,'' Mary Booth, scientist and director at the Partnership for Policy Integrity, wrote in a critique of the draft document.
        The European Commission declined to comment on the draft, but confirmed the revised directive will be published on July 14.
        In the US, federal policymakers have not yet determined the fate of wood pellets.
        Timber scraps cover the ground of a clear-cut site in Northampton County.''Biomass is categorically incompatible with our climate, justice and health goals,'' Democratic Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, who successfully opposed the permitting of a biomass energy plant in his state, said in a statement to CNN. Neither the planet nor the United States, he said, can ''afford to make the same '... mistake that allowed the European Union to put biomass on the exact same level as truly renewable energy sources like wind and solar.''
        Under former President Donald Trump, the Environmental Protection Agency planned to follow in Europe's footsteps and classify biomass as a carbon-neutral energy source, but that never happened. Despite the Biden administration's commitment to fight global warming, activists worry they won't acknowledge the threat of biomass and industrial logging.
        ''It's almost like in the US, all we see of value in a forest is a dollar bill,'' Smith said. ''We don't recognize the costs of this destruction.''
        Back in Northampton, Macklin feels just as defeated.
        ''Us being in a poor area'... I mean, what can we do?'' he said. ''A company like that with money'... we don't got money to fight against it and it seems like we don't got no one fighting for us. Not the state, no one.''
      Haitian authorities have asked US military forces to help stabilize the country
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 03:26
        (C) Richard Pierrin/Getty Images Citizens take part in a protest near the police station of Petion Ville after Haitian president Jovenel Mo¯se was murdered on July 08, 2021 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Richard Pierrin/Getty Images Haitian officials fear terrorists will attack the country's infrastructure in the wake of the assassination of President Jovenel Mo¯se. Haiti's minister of elections told the New York Times that officials have asked the US to send military troops down for support. He said officials want help protecting Haiti's port, airport, and gas supply. See more stories on Insider's business page. Government officials in Haiti have asked the United States military to send in troops to help stabilize the country in the wake of the assassination of President Jovenel Mo¯se.
        Haitian minister of elections, Mathias Pierre, told the New York Times that officials had asked for help protecting Haiti's port, airport, and gas supply following the assassination, saying that he fears "urban terrorists" may attack the country's infrastructure in coming days.
        "The group that financed the mercenaries want to create chaos in the country," he said. "Attacking the gas reserves and airport might be part of the plan."
        In a statement responding to the assassination on Wednesday, President Joe Biden said that the US stood "ready to assist as we continue to work for a safe and secure Haiti."
        The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider regarding whether the US would honor Haiti's request for troops to be sent in.
        Mo¯se's killing came amid escalating political instability and violence in the country. The killing has exacerbated the unrest, with the leadership of Haiti in dispute. Fifteen suspects have been arrested in the killing, including two US citizens. The two Americans said they were working as translators for the hit squad, and were not in the room when the assassination occurred, a Haitian judge investigating the killing said on Friday.
        The motivation for Mo¯se's killing remains unclear, though he had no shortage of enemies. Mo¯se's political opponents accused him of staying in office beyond his term, and his refusal to step down prompted protests. He also faced backlash over the fact he'd been ruling by decree for over a year after dissolving parliament and failing to hold legislative elections.
        The US has staged military interventions in Haiti before, and Marines occupied the country from 1915 to 1934. In the decades that followed the occupation, Haiti saw a number of coups and a series of dictators and military leaders ruled over the country. In 1994, the Clinton administration sent 25,000 troops into Haiti to restore a president who had been ousted via a military coup.
      Nuremberg Code from WWII has nothing to do with coronavirus despite bogus Facebook claims - ABC News
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 03:22
        CoronaCheck is RMIT ABC Fact Check's weekly email newsletter, dedicated to fighting the misinformation infodemic surrounding the coronavirus outbreak.
        You can read the latest edition below, and subscribe to have the next newsletter delivered straight to your inbox.
        CoronaCheck #66In this week's CoronaCheck, we look at suggestions that 2021 will see a new round of Nuremberg-style trials '-- like those held in the aftermath of WWII '-- for supposed "crimes against humanity", committed by organisations and individuals involved in managing the coronavirus pandemic.
        We also check out claims about microchips in vaccines, and bring you the latest debunked images and videos purporting to relate to the ongoing violence in the Palestinian territories.
        The Nuremberg Code and COVID-19? The Nuremberg trials were held in 1945 and 1946 in the aftermath of WWII. (US National Archives
        )Claims that governments, health organisations, philanthropists and others involved in managing the COVID-19 pandemic will be prosecuted for breaches of the Nuremberg Code have taken off in recent weeks.
        Google trends show a notable increase in people searching for "Nuremberg trials" since the onset of the pandemic, as well as a dramatic recent increase in searches for "Nuremberg trials 2021".
        According to one widely shared news article '-- published across numerous questionable websites '-- German-American lawyer Dr Reiner Fuellmich is leading the charge to have the US Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organisation and the "Davos Group" tried for "crimes against humanity".
        Among a number of unsubstantiated, misleading and false claims attributed to Dr Fuellmich are suggestions that COVID-19 vaccines are "in violation of all 10 of the Nuremberg Codes".
        As detailed by UK-based Full Fact, the Nuremberg Code is a set of 10 principles developed in 1947 following the trials of Nazi doctors accused of running inhumane, and often fatal, experiments on concentration camp prisoners without their consent.
        Designed to protect human subjects in medical research, the first principle of the code states that "voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential".
        "Other principles include that the experiment should be for the good of society, that all unnecessary physical and mental suffering or injury should be avoided, and no experiment should be conducted if there is good reason to believe it may result in death or a disabling injury," Full Fact explained.
        "They also say that the human subject should be free to exit the experiment if they are suffering, and that the scientist in charge must be prepared to end the experiment if they have good reason to believe it may cause injury, disability or death to the subject if it continues."
        More than 20 German doctors and scientists went on trial at Nuremberg.(Planet News Archive/SSPL/Getty Images
        )The fake-news article championing Dr Fuellmich's intervention described people being coerced through "lockdowns, duress and threats" to take "experimental" COVID-19 vaccines, which, supposedly, breached the Nuremberg Code.
        But, according to fact checkers, that's not the case.
        Based on expert opinion, Full Fact concluded that the Nuremberg Code would "only be relevant at the research trial stage of a vaccine's development, not its rollout to the general public".
        "But even then, experts told us they felt it would not be an appropriate link to draw," the fact checkers continued.
        So you have questions about the COVID vaccines? We have answers Confused about Australia's vaccine rollout? We've tracked down the answers to the questions you've been asking.
        Read more
        "It's right that medical ethics should be highly scrutinised, especially in cases like the COVID-19 vaccine roll-out where the process has been accelerated. However, it's important not to mix up the atrocities of the past with current debates about medicine and policy."
        AFP Fact Check concluded that similar claims made on Facebook were false.
        "Medical ethics and legal experts said the principles, named after the Nuremberg trials, are compatible with vaccination," they said.
        Reuters, meanwhile, examined a suggestion that a claim made by Dr Fuellmich and his team of lawyers '-- namely, that Israel's COVID-19 vaccine program had violated the Nuremberg Code '-- had been "accepted" by the International Criminal Court.
        "Anyone can submit information about alleged crimes to the ICC's Office of the Prosecutor (OTP)," the fact checkers noted, "and the OTP has cautioned that acknowledgment of receipt is not the same as a decision on the merits of the information."
        Microchip claims make a comeback The claim that COVID-19 vaccines have magnetic qualities has been debunked by fact checkers.(Facebook
        )A video purporting to show a woman sticking a magnet against the arm in which she received the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine has gone viral, amid a renewed onslaught of claims suggesting that coronavirus vaccines contain microchips.
        "[The] COVID-19 shot has magnetic reactions," reads text overlaid on the video.
        But this claim, and others relating to supposedly embedded microchips, have been disproved by fact checkers.
        Factcheck.org noted there were many unknowns about the video, and ones like it, including whether the people filmed had been vaccinated, what types of magnets had been used and whether "other substances" were used to make them stick.
        The fact checkers added that they had previously debunked claims that the vaccines contained microchips, as well as a suggestion that Microsoft founder Bill Gates had planned to use COVID-19 vaccines to track people.
        Stay up-to-date on the coronavirus outbreak Download the ABC News app and subscribe to our range of news alerts for the latest on how the pandemic is impacting the worldThey had also called out another claim that distorted information about plans for technology to track vaccine doses.
        AFP Fact Check, meanwhile, said that the "US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirms on its website that there are 'no trackers' in the vaccines themselves".
        The notion that vaccines could cause a magnetic reaction was also assessed by fact checkers at Reuters who found that "none of the COVID-19 jabs approved in the United Kingdom or the United States contain metallic ingredients".
        This includes the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, as well as the two approved for use in Australia, developed by Pfizer and AstraZeneca.
        PolitiFact also concluded that "the vaccines aren't magnetic".
        They referenced a lecturer at the Centre for Virus Research at the University of Glasgow who said "a large lump of magnetic material beneath the skin" would be needed to cause a magnet to stick.
        From GazaWith the death toll from escalating violence between Israeli forces and Palestinians surpassing 200 this week, fact checkers worked to stem a steady flow of misinformation about the crisis.
        In a number of instances, old images resurfaced alongside suggestions they showed the aftermath of the recent violence.
        Reuters, for instance, found that a video of Palestinians applying "fake blood and wound-like makeup", which was being linked to the current crisis, was in reality filmed by a French charity in 2017 as part of a training exercise.
        In another case of video footage being shared misleadingly, a spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted a video to Twitter, claiming it showed Hamas firing rockets at Israel from populated areas.
        According to BBC Reality Check, the video was actually filmed in Syria in 2018.
        An authentic image of a Palestinian man inspecting damage in Gaza City on May 18.(AP: Khalil Hamra
        )Meanwhile, multiple fact checkers took on a video supposedly showing Palestinians faking a funeral for a child.
        The video, shared on Facebook on May 10, "shows people carrying a stretcher on a street during what appears to be a funeral procession," USA Today's fact check team explained.
        "Later in the clip, the pallbearers scatter and the person on the stretcher stands up and runs away."
        But, as the USA Today team, along with fact checkers at India Today, The Quint, PolitiFact and Reuters discovered, the video originated in Jordan last year.
        "According to Roya News, a news outlet based in Jordan, the 'fake funeral' shows a group violating Jordan's strict [COVID-19] lockdown rules which came into effect on March 20," Reuters reported.
        "The video was presented as one of many lighthearted viral hits in the country showing unique ways citizens circumvented '-- and reacted to '-- the restrictions."
        PM's red-carpet photo criticisedA red-carpet reception rolled out for Prime Minister Scott Morrison during a recent visit to an Australian Air Force base did not follow standard Defence Force protocols, according to two former prime ministers.
        In an article published by Fact Check earlier this week, neither Malcolm Turnbull nor Kevin Rudd could recall ever receiving the red carpet treatment at a military base in Australia.
        A spokeswoman for Mr Turnbull said the former prime minister "doesn't recall any domestic arrivals at a RAAF Base or commercial airport where he was greeted by a Ceremonial Stairway Guard".
        Mr Morrison posted this image from Williamtown RAAF Base on his Instagram account on May 7.(Scott Morrison Instagram
        )Mr Rudd's spokesman added that, to the former Labor leader's knowledge, such a welcome was not standard protocol for a prime-ministerial visit to a Defence Force facility.
        The comments of the former PMs came after a photo was posted to Mr Morrison's Instagram account on May 7 showing the Prime Minister stepping off a plane onto a red carpet flanked by armed ADF members at RAAF Base Williamtown.
        Fact Check also spoke to Neil James, the executive director of the Australia Defence Association, who said he initially thought the photo was a "photoshopped hoax".
        "Is it standard procedure for a prime minister to be greeted by a Ceremonial Stair Guard? The clear answer is, no," Mr James said.
        "It doesn't matter whether you're visiting a ship, an Army base or an Air Force base, this just doesn't happen."
        He added that the decision to post the photo of Mr Morrison to Instagram was "dumb".
        "Surely someone in the Prime Minister's Office should have looked at it and said 'this will embarrass the political neutrality of the Defence Force, we shouldn't use this," he said.
        A spokesman for Mr Morrison declined to answer questions about who arranged for the red carpet and ceremonial guard, but did confirm that the image was not photoshopped.
        Edited by Ellen McCutchan
        Got a fact that needs checking? Tweet us @ABCFactCheck or send us an email at factcheck@rmit.edu.au
        What you need to know about coronavirus: The symptoms The number of cases in Australia Tracking Australia's vaccine rollout Global cases, deaths and testing rates
      Food waste app Too Good To Go saves leftovers from San Francisco restaurants
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 03:08
        As I walk out of San Francisco grocery chain Luke's Local on a recent Tuesday evening, I feel an unexpected wave of guilt wash over me.
        In my hand is a heavy brown paper bag packed full of eight pieces of produce, a ham and goat cheese sandwich, a loaf of seeded country bread, a fancy looking almond pound cake, two chocolate sea salt cookies and a pack of pita bread. Somehow, I only paid $5.99 for this haul that will feed me in various ways for at least a week.
        The pound cake alone has a price sticker on it that says $13.99.
        On this day, the day I feel like I paid a small fee to rob a bank, I decided to get all my meals (or at least my food for a 24-hour period) through the new app Too Good To Go, an anti-food waste company that helps facilitate getting excess food from restaurants and grocery stores to the general public for just $4.99 or $5.99 per ''surprise bag.''
        When I opened the app that morning, I had plenty of San Francisco restaurants and grocery stores to choose from, including many that I'd describe as downright trendy, like Brandon Jew's Mamahuhu and Michael Mina's Indie Superette. I decided to choose a few I knew well, figuring that was my best bet to get a well-rounded day's meals based on what I knew the restaurant stocked. I figured I'd get dinner from House of Dim Sum, breakfast from Daily Driver, the fixing for a lunch from Luke's Local and a sweet treat and maybe a loaf of bread from La Boulangerie.
        I was very, very wrong. You see, each establishment can give a customer anything they want in a ''surprise bag.'' Sometimes the app might describe what's likely to be inside (I saw this rarely), but more often, you just have to guess based on what they serve. But what I was wrong about wasn't necessarily the bag's contents (obviously I expected and was correct that Daily Driver would give me leftover bagels), it was the amount of food inside each bag.
        While costing the customer $4.99, each bag is supposed to have a value of at least $15 (or a $5.99 bag should have a value of $18) and each bag I picked up had at least that, and most times much, much more. My plan for roughly three meals plus a dessert in reality subsidized meals for myself and my husband all week long.
        My haul from La Boulangerie included a banana nut pound cake, a big chocolate chip cookie, a raspberry financier and a baguette for $4.99.
        Tessa McLeanAt La Boulangerie Noe Valley, my bag included a banana nut pound cake, a big chocolate chip cookie, a raspberry financier and a baguette for $4.99 '-- probably the most on the dot to $15 I could get when adding in tax based on my calculations.
        Picking up my dinner at House of Dim Sum, I'm greeted with a giant to-go container full of egg rolls, shrimp dumplings, pot stickers and jian dui, so packed that I share with my husband and it's enough for both our dinners '-- all for $5.99.
        I ate the sandwich from Luke's Local for lunch the next day and used the pita bread to devour some hummus I had in the fridge. And I still had breakfast for the rest of the week '-- six bagels from Daily Driver that usually cost $3.50 per bagel. That's not to mention the bell peppers and onion and garlic I ended up using to supplement a taco dinner later in the week or the pieces of baguette I used to sop up pasta sauce during yet another dinner and the many desserts that came from the various cookies and that very delicious $13.99 pound cake.
        Luke's Local packed a grocery bag full of produce, a ham and goat cheese sandwich, a loaf of seeded country bread, an almond pound cake, two chocolate sea salt cookies and a pack of pita bread '-- all for $5.99.
        Tessa McLeanFood waste is a big problem nationwide, but especially so in the United States. As much as 40% of our food gets thrown away in this country, according to the Department of Agriculture. A 2014 study by the Food Waste Reduction Alliance found that 84.3% of unused food in American restaurants ends up being disposed of, and only 1.4% is donated.
        Too Good To Go was born in Denmark and quickly spread to France, the United Kingdom, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands in 2016. Co-founder Lucie Basch said they knew the key to getting restaurants to participate would be to make the process as simple as possible, making the app easy to use and not requiring any upfront commitments. There's no quota a restaurant has to meet, so they can add food whenever they want and as often as they want.
        The company takes a flat fee of $1.79 per purchase '-- which is pretty high when you convert it to a percentage (about 35% for a $4.99 bag) but pretty low when you consider that most if not all of the food would have generated the restaurant or store zero revenue at all.
        For Beacon Coffee & Pantry owner Alexis Liu, it's a ''win-win'' for her small business in North Beach. Liu said they almost always have some food items leftover at the end of the day, even if it's just one bag's worth of pastries, and she's happy she doesn't have to worry about it going to waste anymore. She also said she believes it's introducing them to new customers who may not have visited the shop before but are now familiar with them and their products.
        ''Even if it's just one bag we sell and the actual amount we get from [the app] is nominal, it's better than nothing and it's better than anything going in a landfill,'' Liu said.
        Basch said that's a big value proposition for restaurants, and while it's not something I initially thought of, I completely agree. I wouldn't have likely ever bought the seeded loaf from Luke's or that expensive pound cake, but now, I might think twice about them if I'm ever shopping again in the store.
        Right now, Too Good To Go is available in New York, Boston, Jersey City, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., Portland and Seattle, in addition to the Bay Area, and the goal is to keep adding more restaurants across the Bay Area to the platform. The company hopes to launch in LA by the end of the year. The company estimates it has saved more than 72 million meals across 15 countries since its launch, which adds up to 250 million pounds of food.
        Lucie Basch, one of Too Good To Go's founders,
        Courtesy of Too Good To GoBasch said she hopes restaurants and grocery stores can learn from participating in the app as well. If a restaurant sees, for example, that they always seem to have 10 leftover baguettes at the end of the day, maybe they could start baking eight less each day and see if that helps their food costs.
        I promise this article isn't sponsored by Too Good To Go, but I was genuinely shocked and pleased by how much food each "surprise bag" contained and the quality of it. For consumers, there just don't seem to be many cons. Sure I got a pear that was way too past its prime to eat, but the bag of groceries was already vastly underpriced, so I didn't feel bad composting a pear that would have ended up being composted at the store. Picking up the items in a narrow time limit can be burdensome (the store sets whatever timing it wants '-- you may have as little as a 15-minute window and up to several hours), but if you're in a neighborhood with a lot of participating restaurants and you have a flexible schedule, it's really not that hard.
        The biggest barrier for many will likely be abiding by dietary restrictions. If you have an extreme allergy, Basch admits the app probably isn't for you, as they can never guarantee what's in any given bag. They do have a filter for vegetarian items, but when I clicked it, most of the restaurants disappeared from my app. But, looking back at my haul, only one out of four places included items with meat.
        If you're on a budget, passionate about reducing food waste and not a picky eater, this app might be exactly the win-win-win it dubs itself as.
        My dinner from House of Dim Sum was full of egg rolls, shrimp dumplings, pot stickers and jian dui '-- all for $5.99.
        Tessa McLean
      Here Are the Top 50 Podcasts in America This Week
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 03:07
        This week, we take a look at which podcasts are top charted on Spotify and Apple respectively.
        On Spotify, The Joe Rogan Experience is the top-rated podcast, followed by the Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard, Distractable, Crime Junkie, and Call Her Daddy.
        Joe Rogan's massively popular show doesn't top the charts at Apple '-- it's exclusive to Spotify '-- but still comes in at 21. The same thing goes for Call Her Daddy, hosted Alex Cooper (53 on Apple) and Armchair Expert, hosted by actor Dax Shepard (33 on Apple).
        Apple's top-rated podcast is Crime Junkie, followed by Paper Ghosts, Drama Queens, The Daily, and Morbid: A True Crime Podcast.
        Spotify:
        The Joe Rogan ExperienceArmchair Expert with Dax ShepardDistractibleCrime JunkieCall Her DaddyUnlocking Us with Bren(C) BrownDrama QueensMorbid: A True Crime PodcastDark HistoryLast Podcast On The LeftInternational Infamy with Ashley FlowersThe DailySmartLessBreaking Points with Krystal and Saagar2 Bears 1 Cave with Tom Segura & Bert KreischerLex Fridman PodcastRotten MangoThe Ben Shapiro ShowAvatar: Braving the ElementsAmerica's Forgotten HeroesConspiracy Theories: CIA EditionSerial KillersWe Can Do Hard Things with Glennon DoyleUp FirstConan O'Brien Needs A FriendChuckle SandwichMy Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia HardstarkErin is the Funny OneAnything Goes with Emma ChamberlainThe Tim Dillon ShowConspiracy TheoriesThe Tiny Meat Gang PodcastRevisionist HistoryDateline NBCThe Mindset MentorStuff You Should KnowHaunted Road with Amy BruniEdith!Office LadiesSupernatural with Ashley FlowersThe Rise and Fall of Mars HillMythology''¨ðŸ‘‘-Dream SMP-ðŸ‘‘''¨Scary Story PodcastLet's Talk About Myths, Baby! A Greek & Roman Mythology PodcastThe Misfits PodcastUnsolved Murders: True Crime StoriesThe Self Love FixLadies & TangentsNPR News NowApple:
        Crime JunkiePaper GhostsDrama QueensThe DailyMorbid: A True Crime PodcastInternational Infamy with Ashley FlowersSmartLessToxic: The Britney Spears StoryDateline NBCWe Can Do Hard Things with Glennon DoyleAmerica's Forgotten HeroesWHOA That's Good PodcastHaunted RoadThe Rise and Fall of Mars HillYour Own BackyardThe Ben Shapiro ShowMy Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia HardstarkUp FirstTo Live and Die in LAPark PredatorsThe Joe Rogan ExperienceRevisionist HistoryStuff You Should KnowEdith!The Piketon MassacreAlgorithmThis American LifeCounterClockUp and VanishedHidden BrainConan O'Brien Needs A FriendOn Another Note,Armchair Expert with Dax ShepardAnatomy of MurderThe Yellow CarSerial2 Bears 1 Cave with Tom Segura & Bert KreischerThe Bible in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz)The Ramsey ShowOffice LadiesMurder With My HusbandOn Purpose with Jay ShettyUnlocking Us with Bren(C) BrownThe World BeneathPardon My TakeThe Clay Travis and Buck Sexton ShowChasing CosbyDark HistoryThroughlineRadiolabHave a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com
      Poop Turns Into Power and Currency With South Korean University Toilet
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:57
        South Korean university professors have designed a toilet that generates power from poop. Students are incentivized to use the toilet with a digital currency called Ggool. The average person's poop in one day can power a car for three quarters of a mile, said a professor. Visit Insider's homepage for more stories. Using a special toilet in South Korea can get you books, fruit, and even freshly brewed coffee.
        Professors at Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, near the southeastern coast of the country, have designed a toilet that converts methane from one's faeces into an energy source.
        Students who use the toilet are rewarded with 10 units of digital currency called Ggool per day. Ggool, which means honey in Korean, can be used at a market on campus to buy items like bananas, stationery, and instant cup noodles, reported Reuters.
        The toilet has been coined the "BeeVi", a shortened version of "Toilet, like a Bee with a Vision," and is meant to be an eco-friendly and sustainable device.
        BeeVi uses a vacuum and a small amount of water to send poop from the toilet into an underground tank and bioreactor, prompting its creators to call it a "super water-saving vacuum toilet."
        Methane from the faeces is turned into a power source for the appliances in the building, including a gas stove, a hot-water boiler, and a fuel cell that produces electricity, said Reuters.
        One of the toilet's designers, urban and environmental engineering professor Cho Jae-weon, told the wire agency that the average person's poop for one day can power a car for three-quarters of a mile.
        "If we think out of the box, faeces has precious value to make energy and manure," said Cho.
        A postgraduate student purchasing items at the Ggool market told Reuters that he now sees poop as a "treasure" because of the new toilet.
        "I even talk about faeces during mealtimes to think about buying any book I want," he said.
      Ranked-Choice Voting Helped Wreck Minneapolis - WSJ
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        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:47
        Minneapolis was once known for its innovative and progressive policy solutions. It produced national political leaders such as Hubert H. Humphrey and Walter Mondale. In the past year, however, Minneapolis has become better known as a badly managed city adrift in politically correct mob rule. How did this once-great city fall so far so fast?
        In 2009, Minneapolis adopted ranked-choice voting, then an untested method of electing city officials. It was sold to voters as a way to increase voter participation and improve the tone of political campaigns. In fact, it has had little positive effect on campaigns and their messaging, and voter turnout remains low. The corrosive effect of ranked-choice voting on democratic legitimacy is partly to blame for Minneapolis's current dire condition.
        In Minneapolis's 2017 mayoral election (which was the third using ranked choice) voter turnout was only 43%. The victor in that 16-way race was Jacob Frey, who prevailed after six rounds of counting that took 24 hours to complete. He became mayor despite being the first choice of only 25% of voters.
        Mr. Frey's most notable first-term achievement was doing nothing last May while rioters burned and looted more than 1,300 buildings, causing an estimated $500 million of damage. He implied that destroying the city was a justifiable social-justice action. When a police precinct was burned to the ground, he showed no special concern. He did make time for a live television interview on MSNBC.
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        Minneapolis has become a city adrift, run by weak leaders like Mr. Frey. The best any of them can do is keep the mob at bay'--and sometimes not even that. On June 27 a crowd that included members of Black Lives Matter and Twin Cities Coalition for Justice 4 Jamar, surrounded a City Council member's car and held her captive until she signed a paper with a list of their demands.
        Public confidence in elections matters. When voters develop doubts about election integrity, they begin to question whether public officials are wielding power legitimately. Ranked-choice voting remains a solution in search of a problem, as a new Freedom Foundation of Minnesota report explains. It replaces the traditional plurality voting system to which most Americans are accustomed with a scheme that denies voters informed choice without ensuring that every vote counts. Ranked choice creates needless complexity that makes voting less, not more, accessible.
        Despite what advocates say, ranked-choice voting doesn't combat voter apathy'--competitive races that engage a broad swath of the electorate do. If advocates truly want greater voter engagement and turnout, they would allow nonpartisan municipal elections to occur during midterm election years, when federal and (in most places) state offices are also contested.
        New York is the latest city to learn the hard way how bad ranked-choice voting can be. It took 15 days for a winner to emerge in the city's Democratic primary for mayor. New Yorkers have also learned that ranked-choice voting actually reduces voter confidence and satisfaction'--even as both are already extremely low.
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        In a 2017 study, political scientist Lindsay Nielson found that ranked-choice voting has ''no positive impact on voters' confidence in elections and the democratic progress.'' Overall, Ms. Nielson's survey respondents ''were not any more likely to prefer RCV elections to plurality or majoritarian elections, and, overall, most voters do not prefer to vote in RCV elections and do not think that they result in fair election outcomes.''
        After 11 years, most Minneapolis voters don't have a great handle on how ranked-choice voting works. Progressive political power brokers seem to be the only ones informed about its mechanics and why it's supposedly preferential to the one-person, one-vote system that worked well for so long. Advocates never mention the most disturbing fact about ranked-choice voting'--sometimes your vote doesn't count in determining the winner. Under ranked-choice voting candidates are eliminated in rounds. The votes of eliminated candidates are redistributed according to the voter's ranked preferences. Ballots on which only one candidate is ranked first are pushed aside when that candidate is eliminated. In the New York Democratic mayoral primary nearly 140,000 ballots ended up being declared ''inactive,'' about 15% of the total.
        ''In the end, it is all about political power, not about what is best for the American people and preserving our great republic,'' according to a 2019 Heritage Foundation report. ''So-called reformers want to change process rules so they can manipulate election outcomes to obtain power.''
        Minneapolis has learned a painful lesson about the connection between democratic legitimacy and public order. Let's hope it isn't too late to turn things around. Scrapping ranked-choice voting would be a step in the right direction.
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        Mr. Weber, a Republican, served as a U.S. representative from Minnesota, 1981-93. Ms. Meeks is president and CEO of the Freedom Foundation of Minnesota, where Mr. Weber is a board member.
      Why most people who now die with Covid in England have had a vaccination | Coronavirus | The Guardian
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:42
        Show caption An 18-year-old boy is vaccinated at Tottenham Hotspur's stadium in London. Photograph: Will Edwards/AFP/Getty Images
        The weekly stats uncoveredDon't think of this as a bad sign, it's exactly what's expected from an effective but imperfect jab
        Sun 27 Jun 2021 03.00 EDT
        A MailOnline headline on 13 June read: ''Study shows 29% of the 42 people who have died after catching the new strain had BOTH vaccinations.'' In Public Health England's technical briefing on 25 June, that figure had risen to 43% (50 of 117), with the majority (60%) having received at least one dose.
        It could sound worrying that the majority of people dying in England with the now-dominant Delta (B.1.617.2) variant have been vaccinated. Does this mean the vaccines are ineffective? Far from it, it's what we would expect from an effective but imperfect vaccine, a risk profile that varies hugely by age and the way the vaccines have been rolled out.
        Consider the hypothetical world where absolutely everyone had received a less than perfect vaccine. Although the death rate would be low, everyone who died would have been fully vaccinated.
        The vaccines are not perfect. PHE estimates two-dose effectiveness against hospital admission with the Delta infections at around 94%. We can perhaps assume there is at least 95% protection against Covid-19 death, which means the lethal risk is reduced to less than a twentieth of its usual value.
        But the risk of dying from Covid-19 is extraordinarily dependent on age: it halves for each six to seven year age gap. This means that someone aged 80 who is fully vaccinated essentially takes on the risk of an unvaccinated person of around 50 '' much lower, but still not nothing, and so we can expect some deaths.
        The PHE report also reveals that nearly a third of deaths from the Delta variant are of unvaccinated people over 50, which may be surprising given high vaccine coverage; for example, OpenSAFELY estimates more than 93% among the 65-69s. But there are lower rates in deprived areas and for some ethnicities and communities with limited coverage will continue to experience more than their fair share of loss.
        Coverage and effectiveness are important numbers for assessing vaccination programmes. It is better to look at cool analysis by analysts, rather than hot takes on social and other media.
        David Spiegelhalter is chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication at Cambridge. Anthony Masters is statistical ambassador for the Royal Statistical Society
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      The FBI's honeypot Pixel 4a gets detailed in new report | Ars Technica
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        At least someone is buying Pixel phones '-- FBI honeypot phones are now public'--and showing up on the secondary market. Ron Amadeo - Jul 9, 2021 8:53 pm UTC
        The Anom login screen, which was hidden in the calculator app. Note the cool "hacker"-style logo.
        If your device ever shows this message during boot and you didn't unlock the phone yourself, run, or throw it in a lake, or blow it up. Whatever you do, don't give it your credentials.
        The ArcaneOS boot screen.
        Last month, authorities disclosed that the FBI and Australian Federal Police secretly operated an "encrypted device company" called "Anom." The company sold 12,000 smartphones to criminal syndicates around the world. These were pitched as secure devices but were actually honeypot devices that routed all messages to an FBI-owned server. The disclosure was light on details, but now that it's public, Anom phones are being unloaded on the secondary market. That means us normal people are finally getting a look at them, starting with this Vice article detailing one of the devices.
        The FBI has basically weaponized what the Android modding community has been doing for years. Some Android phones have unlockable bootloaders, which let you wipe out the original operating system and replace it with your own build of an OS, called a custom ROM. The Anom device Vice got was a Google Pixel 4a, one of the most developer-friendly devices out there. The FBI's custom ROM shows an "ArcaneOS" boot screen, and it replaced the normal Google Android distribution with the FBI's skin of Android 10.
        The FBI's sales pitch to alleged criminals was that these were security-focused devices (so please use them to document your illegal activities!), and that involved a lot of fun security theater. A "pin scrambling" feature would swap around the order of the lock screen numbers so that no one could guess your code from screen smudges.
        Two different interfaces would launch depending on what PIN you typed in on the lock screen. PIN one would show a bunch of popular but non-functional apps, like Tinder, Instagram, Facebook, Netflix, and Candy Crush. Presumably, this was meant to fool any third parties checking out your phone.
        Advertisement A second PIN would enter what was supposed to be the secure section of the phone, showing three apps: a clock, calculator, and the settings. From here, the "calculator" app actually opened a login screen to Anom, which targets were told was a secure, encrypted way to chat. This was basically the smartphone equivalent of a fake book triggering a bookshelf to slide over, revealing a secret passage. It's so secret, it has to be secure!
        With the new knowledge that the FBI phones presented themselves as "ArcaneOS" to users, Vice was able to find several other confused users on the internet who apparently ended up with second-hand FBI devices. Here's a forum post from XDA Developers user "mayday175" asking how to fix their recently purchased, second-hand Pixel 4a with a barely functional build of "ArcaneOS" locked in place. Because nobody had ever heard of this bizarre OS, the user posted a treasure trove of screenshots in an attempt to get help. Mayday writes, "The installed OS is ArcaneOS 10. The system updater says that ArcaneOS 11 is available for download (but I don't want to do that in case it makes this thing even harder to fix)." I wonder how good the FBI is at delivering timely Android OS updates?
        Enlarge / The FBI stripped out a lot of settings that would allow users to look into the phone guts or control things like location.
        Ron Amadeo / Mayday175
        The FBI's compromised phones definitely show some red flags that a tech-savvy user should be able to spot. When you start up an Android phone, the first check that happens is Verified Boot, which makes sure the operating system is cryptographically signed by your device manufacturer, ensuring it hasn't been tampered with. If a device fails verified boot, either from having an unlocked bootloader or a re-locked bootloader with tampered software, it will show a message during startup. In this case, the FBI devices display a message saying, "Your device is loading a different operating system," complete with a yellow exclamation point icon and a link for a Google support page at g.co/ABH. This message is very important.
        Advertisement Like the support page says, if you did this yourself to install a custom ROM or to root your device, it's no big deal, but if you don't know why this message is appearing on your device, that's a huge problem and you should definitely not use the phone. I can't overstate how big of a deal this message is. Verify Boot is "step one" for any and all phone security, and this message indicates that it's compromised. While showing this message, Android will add a 10-second delay to the boot process, and there's even a "Press power button to pause" message on this screen'--because you're supposed to abort the boot sequence if you suddenly see this message.
        Normally, the right way to fix a compromised device like this is to download a clean, official system image from Google, wipe out the unknown OS, and install regular Google Android. Several users report that wouldn't work in this case. ArcaneOS doesn't let users into the Developer Options to unlock the bootloader, so once the FBI unlocks the bootloader, flashes Arcane OS, and locks the bootloader, you're pretty much stuck with ArcaneOS. This is a malicious operating system.
        The FBI changed quite a bit of the core Android OS, stripping out helpful Android settings that might reveal the device's true nature. The system settings for apps, storage, and accounts have been removed. There's now no way to see a list of all the installed system apps, where users might spot something suspicious like "FBI_Spyware.APK." What's installed on the phone is a black box. The FBI also wiped out the "Location" settings, probably in an attempt to stop users from turning off GPS tracking.
        If you aren't interested in having a group chat with the FBI and some targeted criminals, the phones don't seem very useful. They don't have the Play Store or any other Google apps, and other than a clock and the calculator app that leads to this compromised chatting app, it doesn't sound like any other apps worked.
        I'm sure this won't be the last we hear of Anom and Arcane OS. Now that the word is out, and with something like 12,000 devices out there, it's probably only a matter of time before the Android modding community has a full dump of the FBI's Android skin. Who wants to install it?
        Listing image by Vice
      Moya Bailey - Wikipedia
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:01
        African-american feminist scholar and activist
        Moya Bailey is an African American feminist scholar, writer, and activist, notable for coining the term misogynoir, which describes a specific form of discrimination experienced by black women. Bailey is an assistant professor at Northeastern University.[1][2]
        Career [ edit ] Bailey attended Spelman College for her undergraduate degree. She received her doctoral degree from Emory University in the department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. She is currently an assistant professor in the Department of Cultures, Societies, and Global Studies and the program in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Northeastern University.[3]
        She works with the Octavia E. Butler Legacy Network,[4] "an organization that supports and promotes the writer's legacy,"[5] and is the co-founder of Quirky Black Girls, a collective for black women who do not fit cultural stereotypes.[6] She also worked on the project #tooFEW. The hashtag "FEW" stands for "Feminists Engage Wikipedia".[7] The objective of this project was to have feminists engage Wikipedia pages, both adding and editing information regarding individuals, events and things regarding feminism (with a particular focus on Black feminism).[7] She received backlash and derogatory comments for taking part in this initiative.[8]
        Misogynoir [ edit ] Bailey originally coined the term "misogynoir" in 2008, but first used the term in a 2010 essay entitled "They aren't talking about me ...".[9] It is a portmanteau of the word "misogyny" and the French word for "black".[5] The term describes the type of discrimination experienced by black women, specifically the "anti-black racist misogyny that black women experience".
        In a 2014 blog post she wrote:
        I was looking for precise language to describe why Renisha McBride would be shot in the face, or why The Onion would think it's okay to talk about Quvenzhan(C) the way they did, or the hypervisibilty of Black women on reality TV, the arrest of Shanesha Taylor, the incarceration of CeCe, Laverne and Lupita being left off the TIME list, the continued legal actions against Marissa Alexander, the twitter dragging of black women with hateful hashtags and supposedly funny Instagram images as well as how Black women are talked about in music.[10]
        References [ edit ] ^ "On Moya Bailey, Misogynoir, and why both are important" Archived 2018-08-27 at the Wayback Machine. The Visibility Project. Retrieved November 18, 2015. ^ Tiffany, "Queer, Black Geeks, Unite! Moya Bailey Leads Women of Color Digital Skill-Sharing Collective, Shawty Got Skillz". QWOC Media (June 2012). Retrieved November 18, 2015. ^ "Moya Bailey". College of Social Sciences and Humanities, Northeastern University. ^ "About Us". octaviabutlerlegacy.com. Octavia E. Butler Legacy Network. Archived from the original on 2018-03-26 . Retrieved 2015-11-16 . ^ a b Thompson, Martine. " ' Misogynoir' Coiner Moya Bailey Is Eating Pasta and Channeling Her Inner Black Auntie". Bon App(C)tit . Retrieved 2020-08-06 . ^ lex. "Quirky Black Girls". quirkyblackgirls.blogspot.ca. ^ a b "#tooFEW Feminists Engage Wikipedia 3/15 11-3 EST | Moya Bailey". 2013-12-06. Archived from the original on 2013-12-06 . Retrieved 2019-11-21 . ^ "Patriarchy Proves the Point of #tooFEW | Moya Bailey". 2013-12-06. Archived from the original on 2013-12-06 . Retrieved 2019-11-21 . ^ "They aren't talking about me ..." The Crunk Feminist Collective. March 14, 2010. ^ "Moyazb". tumblr.com. External links [ edit ] Official websiteAn Interview with Moya Bailey from Callaloo
      Moya Bailey '' Thrown away where? The world is round.*
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        Misogynoir Transformed Book Cover
        Dr. Moya Bailey is an associate professor in the Department of Communication Studies at Northwestern University. Her work focuses on Black women's use of digital media to promote social justice as acts of self-affirmation and health promotion. She is interested in how race, gender, and sexuality are represented in media and medicine. She currently curates the #transformDH Tumblr initiative in Digital Humanities (DH). She is a monthly sustainer of the Allied Media Conference, through which she is able to bridge her passion for social justice and her work in DH.
        She is a graduate of the Emory University Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Department. She is the founder and co-conspirator of Quirky Black Girls, a network for strange and different black girls and now serves at the digital alchemist for the Octavia E. Butler Legacy Network.
        She attended Spelman College where she initially endeavored to become a physician. She fell in love with Women's Studies and activism, ultimately driving her to graduate school in lieu of medicine. As an undergrad she received national attention for her involvement in the Nelly Protest at Spelman, a moment that solidified her deep commitment to examining representations of Black women in popular culture. She also coined the term misogynoir which describes the unique anti-Black racist misogyny that Black women experience.
        #HashtagActivism Book Cover
        She is a co-author of #HashtagActivism: Networks of Race and Gender Justice and is the author of the forthcoming, Misogynoir Transformed: Black Women's Digital Resistance.
        *The quote in the header comes from Marge Piercy's Woman on the Edge of Time.
      Respectability politics - Wikipedia
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:00
        Respectability politics or the politics of respectability is a form of moralistic discourse used by some prominent figures, leaders or academics who are members of various marginalized groups.
        Academic origin [ edit ] The concept was first articulated in 1993 by Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham in her book Righteous Discontent: The Women's Movement in the Black Baptist Church, 1880''1920. In the context of Black American history, respectability politics was practiced as a way of attempting to consciously set aside and undermine cultural and moral practices thought to be disrespected by wider society, especially in the context of the family and good manners.[1]
        Concept [ edit ] When these figures promote respectability politics, this may serve as an attempt to police some of their fellow group members. Proponents of respectability politics may be attempting to portray their personal social values as being continuous and compatible with dominant values. They may prefer not to challenge the mainstream for its failure to accept the marginalized group into the mainstream and that diversity also exists within the group.[2]
        Respectability politics consists of three main facets. The first facet reinforces a hierarchy to contrast a respectable individual against a shameful other.[3] Any behavior that is deemed unworthy of respect within a specific group will consequently be condemned and considered inferior compared to the differing "respectable" behavior.[3] An example of this is the Madonna-whore dichotomy which categorizes women into these two categories based on the extent to which they express their sexuality, suggesting that women who express it less are superior than their counterparts. The second facet of respectability politics encourages people to defy stereotypes attributed to different aspects of their identity in attempts to present one's self as respectable.[3] For Latina women who are often sexualized and stereotyped as promiscuous, this could take the form of presenting one's self in a conservative manner that deviates from the stereotype. Finally, the third facet involves tailoring one's behavior to better comply with white, middle-class cultural norms, and consequently reinforce the status quo.[3] For example, a person who chooses to speak standard American English, as opposed to African-American vernacular English, to a non-Black audience would be aligning with white cultural norms. Oftentimes, these three facets are practiced by people from marginalized communities who believe that respectability politics will aid them in achieving social mobility.[3]
        Black respectability politics [ edit ] The term "politics of respectability" was first used in the context of Black women and their efforts to distance themselves from the stereotypical and disrespected aspects of their communities.[4] Respectability politics continues to influence the behaviour of racially marginalized Black individuals today who gain status and rights by "adhering to hegemonic standards of what it means to be respectable".[5] Black individuals practicing respectability politics are stereotyped as being most concerned with laziness, intellectual inferiority, violence, and immorality.[5] While respectability politics has been an important way for Black citizens of the United States to integrate into their free lives post-emancipation, today there are many examples of Black individuals arguing that "a deliberate concession to mainstream societal values"[6] does not promote respect, but is instead a defence mechanism of minority communities. Also, some research studies associate part of the high burden of mental health problems with Black Americans on assimilationist behaviours. Researchers, Hedwig Lee & Margaret Takako Hicken argue that further conversations about respectability politics should always consider the challenges Black Americans negotiate in everyday social spaces and establish how they impact Black American mental health.[7]
        The development of African-American politics of respectability has been traced to writers and activists including W. E. B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington, and has been used as a way of understanding the election and political trajectory of Barack Obama.[8][9] The former president has also been criticized for his use of respectability politics during his presidency. For example, he brought up issues of Black criminality during his speech following the November 24th grand jury decision regarding the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.[10][11] One of the most open proponents of respectability politics is former basketball player Charles Barkley.[12]
        Origin [ edit ] In her 1993 book Righteous Discontent: The Women's Movement in the Black Baptist Church, 1880''1920, Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham coined the term "the politics of respectability" to describe social and political changes in the Black community during this time. She particularly focused on the revitalization of the Black Baptist Church and how it became a location of self-help for Black individuals. This was particularly true for Black women, who used the church as a location of resistance against racism and dehumanization. These women built schools and provided social welfare services to enhance their respectability and promote their communities.[13]
        This type of mobilization continued and infiltrated the methodology of teachers in Black communities in the Jim Crow South. Teachers encouraged their students to integrate themselves into white, middle class communities in the hopes of motivating and inspiring students to escape racial injustice. These teachers viewed their profession as a political act, helping young Black students disassociate from negative stereotypes.[14] Black communities were also expected to integrate themselves into being more white in order to gain access to political benefits.
        In the book Black Power: The Politics of Liberation, Kwame Ture, formerly known as Stokely Carmichael, and Charles V. Hamilton, illustrate how the town of Tuskegee, Alabama is not recognized in politics by white politicians. The population of Tuskegee is 95% Black,[15] yet those numbers do not represent the people in politics. Ture and Hamilton go on to discuss how Black people constantly have to prove themselves to white people. It is a never-ending cycle because once one aspect of being white is achieved, another obstacle is placed in their way.[16]
        Health implications of respectability politics [ edit ] On an individual level, respectability politics can manifest itself in impression management behaviors.[17] Across all socioeconomic levels, many Black people agree that partaking in impression management is necessary in order to navigate everyday life in a racialized society.[17] However, these behaviors, also referred to as vigilant behaviors, can have negative consequences on people. In this specific case, vigilance can be defined as "anticipatory and ruminative thoughts and behaviors involved in the preparation for discriminatory treatment and mirror behaviors that align with the presentation of self strategies encouraged by proponents of black respectability politics but likely utilized by many African Americans to engage in racially hierarchical social spaces."[17] For many Black people, vigilant behaviors take the form of altering one's presentation of self (including one's dress, speaking, etc...), "avoiding social situations where likelihood of discrimination may be higher," and "daily preparation for possible experiences with prejudice and discrimination."[17] In other words, these people anticipate stress often, and thus, act accordingly to try to avoid discrimination-based stress. However, research shows that anticipating stress often can be detrimental to one's health because this activates the body's primary stress response system, known as the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis.[17] Activating the HPA axis is helpful in that it activates the body to better deal with said stress.[17] However, when the anticipatory stress is very frequent, it can cause "dysfunction of the stress response system and then poor mental and physical health."[17]
        Black Lives Matter [ edit ] The Black Lives Matter movement is an example of a movement against respectability politics. The movement was motivated by the shooting and death of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed Black teenager. The number of subsequent police killings of unarmed Black men that gained broad national attention motivated a conversation about racial stereotypes and why certain racial stereotypes came to imply Black men are "dangerous". The Black Lives Matter movement argues that people are deserving of rights regardless of "any ostensibly non-respectable behaviour."[18] Instead of acknowledging and shying away from negative Black stereotypes, the Black Lives Matter movement works to expand the concept of what it means to be "respectable" and argue that negatively stereotyped behaviour should not be met with deadly force.[18]
        In line with the growth of the Black Lives Matter movement, some celebrities who have typically shied away from conversations about race have begun to engage with the topic. For example, at the beginning of her career, popular television producer and creator Shonda Rhimes aired shows that had colourblind scripts, despite having diverse casts (e.g. Grey's Anatomy). This was consistent with modern respectability politics in what is sometimes argued to be a post-racial era. Today, Rhimes engages in conversations about racial inequality in the media and addresses racially charged topics on her show, pushing against respectability politics and affirming the rights of all people regardless of their "respectability".[19]
        Rebranding "ratchet" and anti-respectability politics [ edit ] One way to challenge respectability politics is to reclaim negative stereotypes associated with minority communities, rather than disassociate from them. This can take place in the form of rebranding words that have been used as insults towards communities.
        Rebranding of the derogatory term "ratchet" has been one way Black women specifically have pushed back against respectability politics. Black women who identify as ratchet reclaim the negative stereotypes associated with Black culture, such as hyper-sexuality, and instead embrace individualism. The strategy of reclaiming negative stereotypes has been acknowledged as having potential for Black feminine liberation, but has also been criticized for its limitations contained within the confines of the terms that are being reconceptualized. For example, ratchet is associated with heterosexuality, which confines potential to liberate in the context of being "ratchet".[20]
        LGBT respectability politics [ edit ] Respectability politics in the context of the LGBT community is the assimilation of LGBT or otherwise marginalized people based on sexuality and/or transgender status into a hegemonic and heteronormative society. This can be achieved by downplaying stereotypes or behaviors associated with homosexuality (e.g. crossdressing or flamboyant dressing, public displays of same sex affection) or participating in cisgender heterosexual institutions.[21] There are many perspectives on whether engaging in respectability politics is the best way for LGBT people to gain acceptance. One perspective is that assimilation is an important and necessary way for the LGBT community to gain rights, and once they are integrated into society they will have more space to challenge mainstream institutions to make them more inclusive. Another perspective is that assimilation only reinforces cisgender heteronormative institutions and makes diversity invisible.[21] Some LGBT people, for instance, choose to identify themselves as straight-acting, creating controversy within the community.[22]
        Campaigners for LGBT rights have also struggled with the issue of respectability politics. A distinction has been drawn between an attitude that celebrated and affirmed sexual difference in 1960s gay rights campaigns and contemporary approaches that seek to reduce and underplay sexual differences. Gay people are portrayed as having similar values to the wider cisgender heteronormative society which is "a pride ... premised on a nonconscious agreement with dominant views about what is shameful".[23] J. Bryan Lowder, writer for Slate, named Caitlyn Jenner as an advocate of respectability politics in the transgender community. "Since the beginning of the civil rights movement for gays, lesbians, and bisexuals," she writes, "there have been individuals who attempted to gain straight society's approval by distancing themselves from'--or stepping over the bodies of'--more 'radical' elements of the community. ... Respectability politics in the trans community, at least on the public stage, is a newer phenomenon, but it appears that Jenner is positioning herself to lead the way."[24]
        Marriage equality [ edit ] An example of respectability politics used by the LGBT community in the United States was the 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage. Much of the mainstream argument to include the LGBT community in a heteronormative institution like marriage was that the inclusion of LGBT people in marriage would not challenge or change traditional marriage values, like monogamy. In order to benefit from marriage as an institution, the LGBT community argued that their relationships were much akin and perpetuated the same values as heterosexual communities.[25]
        Women [ edit ] In the United States, there are gendered inqualities that define respectable behaviour for both men and women. Historically, women's respectability has been defined by certain attributes that, when subscribed to and followed, lead to certain rights and benefits such as reduced femicide (honor-killing) rates. Whereas men's responsibilities to respectability are often ignored to the point of nonexistence. Consider the #notallmen response to #metoo. Some of the most consistent adjectives used to describe women's respectability are "neat, simple, quiet, (and) modest". Women's respectability politics differ from LGBT and Black respectability politics because in order to be respectable, women must abide by stereotypes of femininity, while LGBT and Black respectability is founded in them not abiding by the stereotypes associated with their own groups.[26] Modern respectability politics for women are also further complicated because of inconsistent societal pressures for women in regards to sexuality. According to Lara Karaian, a professor from Carleton University, women receive inconsistent messages about what is respectable sexual behaviour, which leads to sexual victimization and slut-shaming (most often for young girls).[27]
        Fashion [ edit ] One way in which women can abide by respectability politics is through their clothing. The ways in which women dress is highly indicative of their place and level of respectability within society and the community. Women who dress respectably are more likely to be admitted into social and political institutions. This precedent became most apparent in the Victorian era.[26]
        Marriage [ edit ] According to scholars such as Simone de Beauvoir, getting married is an example of respectability politics for women and men. While being married gives participants access to a variety of benefits like health care and tax benefits, de Beauvoir argues this also comes with the necessity to abide by bourgeois respectability.[28] This type of respectability is specific to women, and requires that women "perform a service in the marriage". These services include satisfying men's sexual needs and caring for the household.[29] Today, respectability politics within marriages are erased by greater levels of economic and social equality between men and women.[30]
        Minorities [ edit ] Asian Americans and respectability politics [ edit ] In response to the elevated rate of hate crimes against Asians during COVID-19 pandemic, Andrew Yang, a 2nd-generation Taiwanese immigrant who ran as a Democrat Presidential candidate in the 2020 United States presidential election, suggested in his Washington Post op-ed that "Asian Americans need to embrace and show our American-ness in ways we never have before. ... We should show without a shadow of a doubt that we are Americans who will do our part for our country in this time of need."[31] This claim has been widely retorted by other Asian American public figures.[32] David Inoue, Executive Director of the Japanese American Citizens League, accused Yang of "blaming the victim" and "fail[ing] to recognize the fundamental reality of the racism" that leads to hate crimes" in his public letter[33] also on Washington Post. Voxcolumnist Li Zhou suggested that Yang's comment "embody respectability politics" and "places the pressure for combating racism on people of color".[34]
        Respectability politics online [ edit ] Scholars have discussed how young people of low socioeconomic status manage impressions online by adhering to normative notions of respectability.[35] This is done through self-censoring, curating a neutral image, segmenting content by platform, and avoiding content and contacts coded as lower class. These strategies simultaneously enable and limit a participants' ability to succeed by reinforcing racist and sexist notions of appropriate behavior.
        Regulating digital sexualities [ edit ] In physical spaces, the female body has been a traditional site of respectability where norms are negotiated and traditional gender roles are upheld.[35] Due to the intersection of racial and gender identities, women of color are further subject to critique and objectification '' a topic with a long history of gendered and racialized respectability politics that center on what women wear, how they engage sexually, and how they behave in public.[36] In our digital society, social media provides another cultural space where these identities have to be negotiated.
        When adhering to respectability norms online, users consider sexual expression and whether or not they want to disclose certain social and sexual practices. In terms of sexuality, respectability politics online values sexual discretion and desexualized self-presentation.[35] The performance of traditional gender roles and sexist social norms define and contribute to the notion of sexuality being viewed as unrespectable. Substantially affecting women, sexuality and respectability online concentrate on the "negative ramifications of explicit female sexuality."[35] User content and language that projects sexually explicit material and sexualization is frowned upon, enticing users to self-censor their online identities and limit participation on social media to avoid negative judgement. Instances where sexaultiy is deemed unacceptable is met with ridicule and public shaming including sexual shaming and othering.
        In the curation of an online sexuality, users must consider if their content falls inside or outside of the acceptable norms before making a post.[35] If a post is viewed as too explicit or lewd, it is likely that that person will be subject to othering through a judgmental gaze. Sexually explicit material or nude photos serve as an example of content that online participants are more likely to view through the judgmental gaze. If a user's post is too explicit, it is likely that that individual will be perceived as an outsider, something that would not only impact their sense of identity in this space but also their ability to succeed.[35]
        In digital spaces, all users are subject to surveillance. Whether this gaze is coming from institutions, government officials, or other participants online, this gaze can directly impact an individual's ability to be perceived as a successful or educated individual. Therefore, users create these digital profiles with respectability politics in mind to avoid being depicted as an outcast.[35] For users who wish to improve their social positioning with upward mobility, these pressures are often top-of-mind, even though digital respectability politics often reproduce racial and gendered hierarchies that are ultimately harmful for society.
        Criticism [ edit ] Respectability politics have been criticized for being "used to rationalize racism, sexism, bigotry, hate, and violence."[37] For example, Bill Cosby "never gave voice to issues of racism, sexism, the failed public school system, health and economic disparities, mass incarceration or police brutality. Instead, he spent over a decade disparaging black folk to the delight of white conservatives." which made him controversial in the black community.[38]
        See also [ edit ] Association of German National JewsBrown Paper Bag TestChaim RumkowskiInternalized oppressionInternalized racismNiggas vs. Black People by Chris RockPassing (sociology)Pound Cake speech by Bill CosbyTone policingUncle TomReferences [ edit ] ^ Victoria W. Wolcott (2001). Remaking Respectability: African American Women in Interwar Detroit. Univ of North Carolina Press. pp. 5''7. ISBN 978-0-8078-4966-8. ^ White, E. Frances (2001). Dark Continent of Our Bodies: Black Feminism and the Politics of Respectability. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. ^ a b c d e Pitcan, Mikaela; Marwick, Alice E.; Boyd, Danah (April 6, 2018). "Performing a Vanilla Self: Respectability Politics, Social Class, and the Digital World". Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. 23 (3): 165. doi:10.1093/jcmc/zmy008 . ^ Paisley, Harris (2003). "Gatekeeping and Remaking: The Politics of Respectability in African American Women's History and Black Feminism". Journal of Women's History. 15: 213. ^ a b Patton, Lori D. (2014). "Preserving Respectability or Blatant Disrespect? A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Morehouse Appropriate Attire Policy and Implications for Intersectional Approaches to Examining Campus Policies". International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education. 27 (6): 724''746. doi:10.1080/09518398.2014.901576. S2CID 55974413. ^ Gross, K.N. (1997). "Examining the politics of respectability in African American studies". Benchmarks Almanac: 43. ^ Lee, Hedwig and Margaret Takako Hicken (2016). "Death by a Thousand Cuts: The Health Implications of Black Respectability Politics". Souls. 2 (2''4): 421''445. doi:10.1080/10999949.2016.1230828. PMC 5703418 . PMID 29187782. ^ Fredrick Harris (15 June 2012). The Price of the Ticket: Barack Obama and Rise and Decline of Black Politics . Oxford University Press. pp. 101''106. ISBN 978-0-19-973967-7. ^ Frederick C. Harris (2014). "The Rise of Respectability Politics". Dissent . Retrieved 25 August 2014 . ^ Nia-Malika, Henderson. " ' Black respectability' politics are increasingly absent from Obama's rhetoric". www.washingtonpost.com . Retrieved 4 March 2015 . ^ Obama, Barack. "Remarks by the President After Announcement of the Decision by the Grand Jury in Ferguson, Missouri". obamawhitehouse.archives.gov . Retrieved 25 November 2018 . ^ Coates, Ta-Nehisi. "Charles Barkley and the Plague of 'Unintelligent' Blacks". www.theatlantic.com . Retrieved 4 March 2015 . ^ Higginbotham, Evelyn Brooks (1993). Righteous Discontent: The Women's Movement in the Black Baptist Church, 1880-1920. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ^ Kelly, Hilton (3 February 2010). " " The Way We Found Them to Be": Remembering E. Franklin Frazier and the Politics of Respectable Black Teachers". Urban Education. 45 (2): 142''165. doi:10.1177/0042085908322726. S2CID 146382642. ^ suburbanstats.org. "Current Tuskegee, Alabama Population, Demographics and stats in 2016, 2017". SuburbanStats.org . Retrieved 2018-01-21 . ^ Carmichael, Stokely (1992). Black power : the politics of liberation in America . Hamilton, Charles V. (Vintage ed.). New York: Vintage Books. ISBN 9780679743132. OCLC 26096713. ^ a b c d e f g Lee, Hedwig; Hicken, Margaret Takako (2016). "Death by a thousand cuts: The health implications of black respectability politics". Souls : A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture, and Society. 18 (2''4): 421''445. doi:10.1080/10999949.2016.1230828. ISSN 1099-9949. PMC 5703418 . PMID 29187782. ^ a b Obasogie, Osagie K.; Newman, Zachary (2016). "Black Lives Matter and Respectability Politics in Local News Accounts of Officer-Involved Civilian Deaths: An Early Empirical Assessment". Wisconsin Law Review. 3: 541''574. ^ Joseph, Ralina L. (2016). "Strategically Ambiguous Shonda Rhimes: Respectability Politics of a Black Woman Showrunner". Souls. 18 (2''4): 302''320. doi:10.1080/10999949.2016.1230825. S2CID 151410081. ^ Pickens, Ther­ A. (2014). "Shoving aside the Politics of Respectability: Black Women, Reality TV, and the Ratchet Performance". Women & Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory. 25: 41''58. doi:10.1080/0740770X.2014.923172. S2CID 144271841. ^ a b Robinson, Brandon Andrew (2012). "Is This What Equality Looks Like?: How Assimilation Marginalizes the Dutch LGBT Community". Sexuality Research and Social Policy. 9: 327''336. doi:10.1007/s13178-012-0084-3. S2CID 146137993. ^ Clarkson, Jay (March 22, 2006). " " Everyday Joe" versus "pissy, bitchy, queens": gay masculinity on StraightActing.com". The Journal of Men's Studies. Archived from the original on September 30, 2007. ^ Deborah B. Gould (15 December 2009). Moving Politics: Emotion and ACT UP's Fight against AIDS. University of Chicago Press. pp. 89''91. ISBN 978-0-226-30531-8. ^ Lowder, J. Bryan. "Caitlyn Jenner vs. "the Community " ". Slate. ^ Matsick, Jes L. and Terri D. Conley (2015). "Maybe "I Do," Maybe I Don't: Respectability Politics in the Same-Sex Marriage Ruling". Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy. 15: 409''413. doi:10.1111/asap.12085. ^ a b Evans, Mary (2016). "Women and the Politics of Austerity: New Forms of Respectability" (PDF) . British Politics. 11 (4): 438''451. doi:10.1057/s41293-016-0037-1. S2CID 157531913. ^ Karaian, Lara (2014). "Policing 'sexting': Responsibilization, respectability and sexual subjectivity in child protection/crime prevention responses to teenagers' digital sexual expression". Theoretical Criminology. 18 (3): 282''299. doi:10.1177/1362480613504331. S2CID 143888113. ^ de Beauvoir, Simone (1989). The Second Sex. New York: Vintage Books. ^ Marso, Lori Jo (2010). "Marriage and Bourgeois Respectability". Critical Perspectives: Politics and Gender. 6: 145''152. doi:10.1017/S1743923X09990572. ^ Coontz, Stephanie (September 1, 2007). "The Family Revolution". Greater Good: Science of a Meaningful Life. University of California, Berkeley. ^ Yang, Andrew. "We Asian Americans are not the virus, but we can be part of the cure". ^ Harpalani, Vinay. "Racial Stereotypes, Respectability Politics, and Running for President: Examining Andrew Yang's and Barack Obama's Presidential Bids". Race and the Law Professor Blog. ^ Inoue, David. "Blaming the victim during a time of vulnerability". ^ Zhou, Li. "Andrew Yang told Asian Americans to prove their Americanness. Here's why that's wrong". ^ a b c d e f g Pitcan, Mikaela (2018). "Performing a Vanilla Self: Respectability Politics, Social Class, and the Digital World". Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. 23 (3): 163''179. doi:10.1093/jcmc/zmy008 . ^ Ford, T. (2015). SNCCs soul sisters: Respectability and the style politics of the Civil Rights Movement.In Thadious M. Davis, Mary Kelley (Eds.), Liberated threads: Black women, style, and the globalpolitics of soul (pp. 67''94). Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press. ^ "Where Does The 'Pull Up Your Pants' School Of Black Politics Come From?". NPR.org . Retrieved 2020-12-08 . ^ Coleman, Arica L. "Perspective | Bill Cosby played respectability politics. It blew up in his face". The Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286 . Retrieved 2020-12-08 .
      The Power Of The Black Hair Bonnet: Why It's Not Unprofessional To Wear It Outside | YourTango
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        The history of bonnets is not lost on Black households.
        For many Black women and men, wearing a bonnet to bed has been the way of protecting our hair and keeping it moisturized throughout the night.
        Growing up, it was strictly only for wearing around the house. It was the routine: wake up, take your bonnet off, and go about your morning routine.
        RELATED: On Being A Black Woman In America
        A bonnet was never seen as a hair accessory to parade around outside; in fact, I remember all the times my mother and I would be running errands, and we'd see a Black woman walking around in her black, silky hair wrap.
        My mom would wrinkle her nose, turning to me to whisper how such an act was ''ghetto.''
        I used to agree with her, thinking to myself, ''Why couldn't she just have done her hair? Why did she have to come outside like that?''
        Now, as I've gotten older, I don't blame myself or my mother for having those thoughts.
        It's always been instilled in every Black person that we need to leave our houses looking presentable. Have our edges done, hair slicked back, braids in pristine condition.
        Because everyone is already judging us, and we don't need to give them another reason.
        Even at the age I am now, when I need to run down to simply get a package from my mailroom, I quickly do my hair in a manner that won't cause people to stare or make comments.
        Because that's the reality of being a Black woman.
        Black women have been fighting for the freedom to wear their hair however they want to for way too long.
        From fighting to wear their afros in the office to braids at school, it's been a constant uphill battle to simply be viewed equally.
        It's different when a Black woman leaves her house with her hair sticking up '-- the concept of a ''messy bun'' isn't in our vocabulary.
        But why is that?
        Why can't we go outside in our bonnets and head scarves, especially to work or to school? Why can't we hop on zoom calls in the luxury of our own homes wearing them?
        It's the fear of how society will look at us, how they will wrinkle up their noses like that many times my mother has done it.
        We'll look as if we don't have any home-training, we don't know how to present ourselves to the world. As if the world determines our own self worth, our own value.
        RELATED: It's Not Black People's Job To Solve Racism
        Black hair shouldn't have to symbolize our work ethic.
        It shouldn't matter if our hair is braided up to perfection, or straightened with no hairs sticking out. There is no difference between that Black person and the one who is walking down the street with their hair wrapped under that bonnet.
        Subscribe to our newsletter.Join now for YourTango's trending articles, top expert advice and personal horoscopes delivered straight to your inbox each morning.
        No one blinks an eye when a white woman wears a bandana in her hair, or even steps outside with a messy bun.
        In fact, there are too many YouTube tutorials to count of the same white women showing their audience how to roll out of bed and throw their hair up.
        But I'm here to say, "To hell with that."
        Black women have been berated and kicked aside for too many years.
        We have been the butt of horrible jokes, and the punching bag for not only America, but the entire world.
        If we want to start wearing our bonnets outside, then we will.
        It doesn't affect our capacity to work, and it doesn't mean we are any less then our white counterparts.
        If you're a Black woman reading this: go out in your silk scarves and bonnets.
        And don't ever let society tear you down for something so sacred, something that defines who we are, and especially what our hair means to us.
        RELATED: 30 Angela Davis Quotes That Remind Us To Never Get Passive In The Fight For Justice
        More for You on YourTango:Nia Tipton is a writer living in Chicago. She covers pop culture, social justice issues, and trending topics. Follow her on Instagram.
      Beyond Respectability: A New Book on Black Female Public Intellectuals | AAIHS
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        This post is part of my blog series that announces the publication of selected new books in African American History and African Diaspora Studies. Today is the official release date for Beyond Respectability: The Intellectual Thought of Race Women, published by the University of Illinois Press.
        ***
        The author of Beyond Respectability is Brittney C. Cooper, a newly tenured Associate Professor of Women's and Gender Studies and Africana Studies at Rutgers University. She teaches courses on Black feminist theory, Black Intellectual Thought, Hip Hop, Gender and Media. Cooper is a widely sought-after public speaker at universities throughout the country and an in-demand commentator for radio, podcasts, and television. Her work and words have appeared at MSNBC, BET, NPR, PBS, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, TV Guide, New York Magazine, Salon.com, The Root.com, and Al Jazeera America, among many others. She is a regular contributor at Cosmpolitan.com and co-founder of the Crunk Feminist Collective and blog. Cooper is also the author of the forthcoming Eloquent Rage: One Black Feminist's Refusal to Bow Down (St. Martin's Press, 2018) and co-editor of The Crunk Feminist Collection (The Feminist Press, 2017).
        Cooper is also the recipient of numerous awards for her research, teaching, and service. In 2015, the African American Review awarded her its Darwin T. Turner Prize for the top journal article in any time period in African American Literature or Culture. In 2016, she was awarded the Northeast Council of Graduate Schools Excellence in Teaching Award for Masters Level Instruction. In 2016, she was also awarded the Olga Vives Award from the National Organization of Women and awarded the Top Blogger Award by the NewsWomen's Club of New York. In 2017, she was awarded the Black Feminist Waymaker and Shapeshifter Award by Black Women's Blueprint, Inc.
        In the late nineteenth century, a group of publicly active African American women emerged from the social and educational elite to assume racial leadership roles. Their work challenged thinking on racial issues as well as questions about gender, sexuality, and class.
        Beyond Respectability charts the development of African American women as public intellectuals and the evolution of their thought from the end of the 1800s through the Black Power era of the 1970s. Eschewing the Great Race Man paradigm so prominent in contemporary discourse, Brittney C. Cooper looks at the far-reaching intellectual achievements of female thinkers and activists like Anna Julia Cooper, Mary Church Terrell, Fannie Barrier Williams, Pauli Murray, and Toni Cade Bambara. Cooper delves into the processes that transformed these women and others into racial leadership figures, including long-overdue discussions of their theoretical output and personal experiences. As Cooper shows, their body of work critically reshaped our understandings of race and gender discourse. Cooper's work, meanwhile, confronts entrenched ideas of how'--and who'--produced racial knowledge.
        At the cutting edge of black women's intellectual history, Brittney C. Cooper weaves together the ideas and lived experiences of women heretofore known as activists rather than thinkers. Through exacting analysis, a feminist lens, and her signature verve, Cooper establishes the centrality of black women's ideas to twentieth century political thought. This is a pathbreaking history of ideas.'' '--Martha S. Jones, author of All Bound Up Together: The Woman Question in African American Public Culture, 1830''1900
        Ibram X. Kendi: What type of impact do you hope your work has on the existing literature on this subject? Where do you think the field is headed and why?
        Brittney C. Cooper: Beyond Respectability intervenes in the scholarly conversation about the role of the politics of respectability in the lives of 19th- and 20 th- century Black women, like Anna Julia Cooper, Mary Church Terrell, Fannie Barrier Williams, Pauli Murray, and Toni Cade Bambara. Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham began this conversation nearly 25 years ago with her groundbreaking book Righteous Discontent. However, the troubling class politics that were frequently associated with some Black female leaders at the turn of the 20 th century have left a bad taste in the mouths of newer generations of scholars who largely wrote off race women as uncritical elitists.
        Beyond Respectability makes three key interventions: first, it moves to situate the National Association of Colored Women as its own school of intellectual thought, a move that makes clear where Black women intellectuals received their training and intellectual orientation to the world. Second, it argues that respectability politics cannot be understood solely as a form of class policing among Black women. Rather, I argue that respectability discourse is an early form of gender theorization emerging from Black communities in the aftermath of Reconstruction. Respectable ideology is an attempt to give meaning, shape, and form to categories of manhood and womanhood that Anna Julia Cooper argued had been ''impoverished'' in the process of slavery. Rather than excusing problematic class politics, viewing respectability discourse as a form of gender theorizing points us to Black communities' intellectual debates about the meanings and performances of gender and the relationship of these gender performances to notions of Black identity and to the project of Black freedom.
        Third, I argue that race women themselves maintained a healthy skepticism about respectability politics and often looked for opportunities to subvert it. In particular, Murray and Bambara revise and critically challenge heteronormative and cisnormative ideas about Black gender and sexuality. I hope that by taking on these women as theorists and thinkers engaged in a multigenerational conversation about Blackness, feminism, and womanhood, that we can enrich both our existing intellectual history and the conceptual terrain from which we theorize around race, gender, sexuality, and feminism. I hope to see more and more work extending the field of Black women's intellectual history (like that of Bay, Savage, Griffin, Jones in 2015), work that takes seriously Black women as theorists, and work that takes up historical arguments among Black women about the meanings of race, gender, and sexuality as salient political categories.
        Copyright (C) AAIHS. May not be reprinted without
        permission.
      UI Press | Brittney C. Cooper | Beyond Respectability: The Intellectual Thought of Race Women
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        Beyond RespectabilityThe Intellectual Thought of Race WomenAwards and Recognition:' Merle Curti Intellectual History Award, Organization of American Historians (OAH), 2018' A Choice Outstanding Title, 2018; One of Zora Magazine's 100 Best Books by African American Women Authors
        The women and ideas behind the triumph of the black female intellectual
        In the late nineteenth century, a group of publicly active African American women emerged from the social and educational elite to assume racial leadership roles. Their work challenged thinking on racial issues as well as questions about gender, sexuality, and class.
        Beyond Respectability charts the development of African American women as public intellectuals and the evolution of their thought from the end of the 1800s through the Black Power era of the 1970s. Eschewing the Great Race Man paradigm so prominent in contemporary discourse, Brittney C. Cooper looks at the far-reaching intellectual achievements of female thinkers and activists like Anna Julia Cooper, Mary Church Terrell, Fannie Barrier Williams, Pauli Murray, and Toni Cade Bambara. Cooper delves into the processes that transformed these women and others into racial leadership figures, including long-overdue discussions of their theoretical output and personal experiences. As Cooper shows, their body of work critically reshaped our understandings of race and gender discourse. Cooper's work, meanwhile, confronts entrenched ideas of how--and who--produced racial knowledge.
        Film Credit: Bob Greenberg at Brainwaves
        "A work of crucial cultural study. . . . [Beyond Respectability] lays out the complicated history of black woman as intellectual force, making clear how much work she has done simply to bring that category into existence."--NPR "If black women's history is your thing, Beyond Respectability should definitely be on your reading list."--Bitch
        "Beyond Respectability is an intricate temporal and spatial tapestry that weaves together the development and evolution of black feminist thought. Cooper's sophisticated analysis not only recovers the intellectual proficiency of race women, but also emphasizes the embodied nature of public intellectualism."--Antipode
        "Beyond Respectability is an invigorating testament to the pivotal legacies of changemakers like Pauli Murray, Anna Julia Cooper, and Mary Church Terrell and why the intellectual work of black women cannot and will not be forgotten."--Signature
        "Cooper's study demands that we dive deeper into the intellectual artifacts left by black women thinkers as a means of supporting the evolution of black feminist discourse and political action."--Public Books
        "Beyond Respectability is one small part of a much larger picture. This is a valuable contribution to the whole."--Journal of American History
        "Beyond Respectability is a multifaceted and robust record of women's important work. . . . There's something in Beyond Respectability for every race woman-- and for the activist, the herstorian, the public intellectual, and the student, and all guardians of our nation's honest history."--Women's Review of Books
        "By moving 'beyond respectability,' Cooper's black feminist thought takes us into the constructive possibility that has marked so many black women's lives."--Christian Century
        "Beyond Respectability is a memorable narrative of struggle and triumph. Its lasting impact is Brittney C. Cooper's willingness to share how race women intellectuals are the reason why scholars can write of Black women thinkers' contributions today."--Women's History Review
        "One of the best books written on black women's intellectual traditions thus far. This book is an intellectually stimulating must-read for individuals interested in, but not limited to, black feminism and black intellectual thought. It should be a required text in African American studies, gender studies, feminist philosophy, and literary studies, among others."--Hypatia Reviews
        "Beyond Respectability can be read as a brilliant critique to academia's superficial engagements with gender and race theory." --Women's Studies International Forum
        "At the cutting edge of black women's intellectual history, Brittney Cooper weaves together the ideas and lived experiences of women heretofore known as activists rather than thinkers. Through exacting analysis, a feminist lens, and her signature verve, Cooper establishes the centrality of black women's ideas to twentieth century political thought. This is a pathbreaking history of ideas."--Martha S. Jones, author of All Bound Up Together: The Woman Question in African American Public Culture, 1830–1900 "Brittney Cooper's Beyond Respectability. . . .makes an important contribution to a large body of scholarship that analyzes the long history of Black women's intellectual discourse. Focusing on the feminist theorizing of selected 'race women,' especially Fannie Barrier Williams, Anna Julia Cooper, Mary Church Terrell, Pauli Murray, and Toni Cade Bambara, Cooper probes their interior lives in new ways and makes more visible the complexities of their public stances. Her brilliant analysis and queer reading of Murray's life is perhaps its most compelling revisionist intervention."--Beverly Guy-Sheftall, coeditor of Words of Fire: An Anthology of African Feminist Thought
        Brittney C. Cooper is an assistant professor of women's and gender studies at Rutgers University.
        To order online://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/68emc6tz9780252040993.html
        To order by phone:(800) 621-2736 (USA/Canada)(773) 702-7000 (International)
      Virginia Foster Durr | Encyclopedia of Alabama
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        Over the course of her long life, Virginia Foster Durr (1903-1999) was a constant presence in
        Alabama politics and the
        movement for civil rights. Her life spanned most of the twentieth century, and Virginia Durr had a front-row seat for the
        New Deal, McCarthyism, and the civil rights movement. She spent years working to abolish the poll tax and to end
        segregation, and her husband,
        Clifford, an attorney, was involved with a number of civil rights cases.
        Virginia Foster DurrVirginia was born on August 6, 1903, in Birmingham, Jefferson County, to the family of Sterling Foster, a prominent Presbyterian minister, and Anne Patterson Foster. Her upbringing was steeped in traditional white southern mores, including acceptance of racial segregation, and she was taught to behave as a "southern lady." Although her family was not wealthy, Virginia was sent to finishing school in New York, where she followed a rigorous academic program and was trained in the social graces. As a sophomore at Wellesley College, Durr came to question segregation after her experience in the college's dining hall with "rotating tables," the school's policy of requiring students to eat meals with random groups of students, including African Americans. Durr initially protested this policy but was told that she could either accept it or leave the college; she chose to accept it.
        Because of financial difficulties, Durr was forced to leave college during her junior year and return to
        Birmingham, where she met attorney Clifford Durr at church. Virginia had already rejected several suitors, and her family had begun to worry that she would never marry. After a brief courtship, she and Clifford married in April 1926. In 1933, the Durrs moved to Washington, D.C., after her husband accepted a position with the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, an agency founded by the Hoover administration to try to shore up the economy in the early years of the Great Depression. He was later appointed to the Federal Communications Commission by Franklin Roosevelt. It was during their time in Washington and through her husband's New Deal contacts that Virginia Durr's activism began. She joined the Woman's National Democratic Club and began a long involvement in the campaign to abolish the poll tax, which effectively denied most southern African Americans and poor whites the right to vote.
        Clifford and Virginia DurrIn 1938, while still living in Washington, Durr became one of the founding members of the
        Southern Conference for Human Welfare. Formed in part as a response to Franklin Roosevelt's proclamation that the South was the leading economic problem in the nation, the SCHW was a biracial coalition formed in Birmingham in 1938 to challenge racial segregation and improve living and working conditions in the South. It was as democratic an organization as could be found in the South of the 1930s, drawing support from professors and journalists as well as
        mine workers and
        sharecroppers. The organization was spearheaded by a wide array of southern liberals, including Lillian Smith, Jim Dombrowski of the Highlander Folk School, and Supreme Court justice
        Hugo Black, who was also Durr's brother-in-law. Eleanor Roosevelt was also present for the inaugural meeting in Birmingham, where she caused a minor controversy by refusing to sit in segregated seating. Durr was drawn to the SCHW primarily because of her interest in ending the poll tax, but she was also attracted to the group's work with
        labor unions and its stance on civil rights. In 1941, Durr became vice president of the SCHW's civil rights subcommittee, along with Texas representative Maury Maverick, who served as president. Although the SCHW was continually criticized by the conservative press because of its civil rights work and its alleged Communist ties, Durr later recalled her work with the organization as one of the happiest events of her life.
        In 1941, the SCHW's civil rights committee became the National Committee to Abolish the Poll Tax, with Durr as its vice-chair. Like the SCHW, the NCAPT was continually attacked for its reputed Communist associations. The organization did, on occasion, receive financial support from various Communist-backed organizations, and Joseph Gelders, a Birmingham native and public Communist, was very active in both groups. As a whole, however, the red-baiting tactics of the group's critics appear to be largely unfounded. The NCAPT accepted support from anyone who opposed the poll tax and made no distinctions based on political affiliations. Nevertheless, the Durrs would continue to be plagued by rumors that she was a Communist.
        Because the Durrs did not publicly denounce Communism or join in the fierce red-baiting of the postwar years, they were often targeted by anti-Communist activists. In 1954, Durr was called to New Orleans to testify before Senator James Eastland's Internal Security Committee, an agency similar to the House Un-American Activities Committee in its objective of investigating alleged Communists. The hearings in New Orleans came on the eve of the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka ruling, which was expected to strike down segregation in public education. Scholars have suggested that Durr was targeted because Eastland wanted to strike back at Hugo Black, who had joined in the unanimous Supreme Court decision in favor of Brown. She was brought before the committee ostensibly because of her work with the Southern Educational Fund, an allegedly "subversive" organization. Durr gave her name, stated that she was not a Communist, and then refused to answer further questions, standing in silent defiance of the committee as she was questioned, occasionally taking out a compact and powdering her nose. The stress of the hearings caused Clifford Durr to suffer a nervous collapse.
        Virginia Durr and Rosa ParksBy the early 1950s, the Durrs were again living in Alabama, having moved to
        Montgomery in time to witness the civil rights movement. Given their long-standing commitment to ending segregation, it was perhaps inevitable that both the Durrs would become intimately involved in the struggle. Through their work for civil rights, the Durrs were acquainted with
        E. D. Nixon, who was head of the Montgomery branch of the Pullman Porters Union as well as president of the local
        NAACP chapter;
        Rosa Parks, who occasionally worked as a seamstress for the Durrs; and
        Martin Luther King and
        Coretta Scott King. During Durr's work with the SCHW, James Dombrowski had introduced her to the Highlander Folk School, of which he was a co-founder. Highlander was a settlement house in rural Tennessee that taught passive resistance techniques. She was immediately taken with the institution because of its work with miners and with labor unions. Because of her earlier association with Highlander, Virginia Durr was able to secure a scholarship for Rosa Parks to attend the school for two weeks in 1954. When Parks was arrested in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus to a white man, Clifford Durr and E. D. Nixon bailed her out of jail. The Durrs continued their work for civil rights once the
        boycott was underway, with Clifford Durr advising civil rights attorney
        Fred Gray on the cases that challenged segregated transportation.
        Virginia Foster Durr and Johnnie CarrFor most of the 1960s, the Durr household was a hub of civil rights activity, as the Durrs opened their home to journalists, activists, historians, and attorneys who were drawn to Montgomery during the
        Freedom Rides or the
        Selma to Montgomery March. The Durrs were well-known in Montgomery, and their liberal politics and support for civil rights activists did not always endear them to their fellow white Alabamians. Frequently harassed and threatened, the Durrs eventually sent the two youngest of their five children to boarding schools outside the South after they were ostracized by teachers and classmates. Virginia's experiences during the civil rights movement convinced her that
        poverty was the greatest problem afflicting the United States, and much of her later work grew out of that conviction.
        Clifford Durr died in 1975. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Virginia Durr continued to write and speak on behalf of progressive political causes. In 1985, she published her autobiography, Outside the Magic Circle, which was widely praised. She was active in state and local politics well into her early nineties, often protesting nuclear weapons and working to achieve economic equality. Durr died on February 24, 1999, at the age of 95. In the years since her death, Virginia Durr has been lauded as one the of the earliest and most loyal champions of civil rights. In 2003, much of her civil rights era correspondence was published by Patricia Sullivan as Freedom Writer: Virginia Foster Durr, Letters from the Civil Rights Years.
        Additional ResourcesDurr, Virginia Foster. Social Activism and Civil Rights. Microform. New York: Columbia University Oral History Collection, 1976.
        '--'--'--. Outside the Magic Circle: The Autobiography of Virginia Foster Durr, edited by Hollinger F. Barnard. 1985. Reprint, Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1990.
        Sullivan, Patricia, and Virginia Foster Durr. Freedom Writer: Virginia Foster Durr, Letters from the Civil Rights Years. New York: Routledge, 2003.
        Published:&nbsp&nbspJune 13, 2008&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp|&nbsp&nbsp&nbspLast updated:&nbsp&nbspNovember 1, 2018
      The Princess and the Frog - Wikipedia
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        2009 American animated musical fantasy film by Disney
        The Princess and the Frog is a 2009 American animated musical fantasy romantic comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The 49th Disney animated feature film, the film is loosely based on the novel The Frog Princess by E. D. Baker, which is in turn based on the Brothers Grimm fairy tale "The Frog Prince". Written and directed by Ron Clements and John Musker, the film stars Anika Noni Rose, Bruno Campos, Michael-Leon Wooley, Jim Cummings, Jennifer Cody, John Goodman, Keith David, Peter Bartlett, Jenifer Lewis, Oprah Winfrey, and Terrence Howard. Set in the 1920s New Orleans, the film tells the story of a hardworking waitress named Tiana who dreams of opening her own restaurant. After kissing a prince who has been turned into a frog by an evil witch doctor, Tiana becomes a frog herself and must find a way to turn back into a human before it is too late.
        The Princess and the Frog began production under the working title The Frog Princess. It marked Disney's brief return to traditional animation, as it was the mainstream animation studio's first traditionally animated film since Home on the Range (2004). Clements and Musker, directors of Disney's highly successful films The Little Mermaid (1989), Aladdin (1992), and Hercules (1997) returned to Disney to direct The Princess and the Frog. The studio returned to a Broadway musical-style format frequently used during the Disney Renaissance and features music written by composer Randy Newman, well known for his musical involvement in Pixar films such as the Toy Story franchise.
        The Princess and the Frog opened in limited release in New York and Los Angeles on November 25, 2009, and in wide release on December 11, 2009. The film received largely positive reviews from critics and audiences, praising the animation (particularly the revival of the medium), characters, music, and themes, and was also successful at the box office, ranking first place on its opening weekend in North America, and grossing around $269 million worldwide becoming Disney's most successful traditionally animated film since Lilo & Stitch in 2002, and the animation studio's most successful film overall since Tarzan in 1999, ten years earlier. It received three Oscar nominations at the 82nd Academy Awards: one for Best Animated Feature and two for Best Original Song. It lost to Up and Crazy Heart, respectively.[4]
        Plot In 1912 New Orleans, a girl named Tiana and her friend Charlotte La Bouff listen to Tiana's mother read the story of The Frog Prince.[5] Charlotte, a believer in true love, finds the story romantic; Tiana declares she will never kiss a frog.
        In 1926, Tiana is now an aspiring chef, who works as a hotel maid and a waitress in a local diner, in order to save enough money to open up her own restaurant, a dream she shared with her father, who supposedly died in World War I.
        Despite Prince Naveen of Maldonia arriving in New Orleans to better his financial situation, he does nothing to improve it. After being cut off by his parents for being a philanderer and spendthrift, Naveen intends to marry a rich Southern belle, and Charlotte is the perfect candidate. Eli "Big Daddy" La Bouff, a rich sugar baron and Charlotte's father, hosts a masquerade ball in Naveen's honor. Charlotte hires Tiana to make beignets for the ball, giving her enough money to buy an old sugar mill to convert into her restaurant. Meanwhile, Naveen and his valet, Lawrence, meet a witch doctor, Dr. Facilier. Inviting them into his emporium, Facilier convinces them that he can make their dreams come true, but neither gets what he expects: Naveen is transformed into a frog while Lawrence, now recruited as Facilier's henchman, receives a voodoo talisman that gives him Naveen's appearance. Facilier intends for the transformed Lawrence to marry Charlotte, after which he will kill La Bouff and split his fortune with Lawrence, secretly giving himself the larger sum.
        At the ball, Tiana discovers she may lose the mill to a higher bidder. She then meets Naveen, who, believing her to be a princess because of her costume, asks her to kiss him and break Facilier's spell. In exchange for the money needed, Tiana reluctantly accepts. Still, since she is not an actual princess, she is turned into a frog herself when she kisses Naveen, which also gives her the ability to talk to other animals. A chase ensues, and Tiana and Naveen escape to a bayou. In the bayou, Tiana and Naveen meet a trumpet-playing alligator, Louis, who dreams of playing in a band with humans, but whose ferocious appearance prevents him from doing so. They also meet a Cajun firefly, Ray. Ray believes that the Evening Star is another firefly named "Evangeline," and is deeply in love with her; no one has the heart to tell him otherwise. Louis and Ray offer to lead Tiana and Naveen to a voodoo queen, Mama Odie, who they believe can undo the curse. During the journey, Tiana and Naveen develop feelings for each other. Meanwhile, Facilier makes a deal with the voodoo spirits (his "friends on the other side"), offering them the souls of the people of New Orleans; in exchange, the spirits grant Facilier the services of a host of shadow demons, whom he orders to find and capture Naveen.
        When the four find Mama Odie after escaping from several of the demons and a trio of bumbling frog hunters, she tells them that Naveen must kiss a true princess to break the spell. They return to New Orleans to find Charlotte, the princess of the Mardi Gras Parade, but only until midnight. Naveen tells Ray he loves Tiana and is willing to give up his dreams for her, but before he can, he is captured by the demons and brought to Facilier. After Ray tells Tiana that Naveen loves her, Tiana goes to the parade to confess her love for Naveen, only to find Lawrence, still masquerading as Naveen, marrying Charlotte. Tiana flees, heartbroken. Ray rescues the real Naveen and steals the charm that disguises Lawrence, finds Tiana, and gives her the charm, explaining the deception. He then turns to hold off the demons so she can escape but is mortally wounded by Facilier in the process. Facilier then offers to make Tiana's restaurant dream come true in exchange for the talisman. Realizing she would rather be with Naveen and recognizing Facilier's true intentions, Tiana destroys the tailsman by smashing it on the ground. With Facilier's plan foiled, Tiana watches the angered voodoo spirits drag Facilier and his shadow into the voodoo spirit world for his debts to them, with his frightened expression placed on a tombstone.
        As Lawrence is taken away by the police, Naveen explains everything to Charlotte; Tiana and Naveen reveal their love to each other. Charlotte agrees to kiss Naveen so he and Tiana can be together as people, but the clock strikes midnight, and the kiss fails to work. The couple decides they are content to live together as frogs. Ray dies shortly after, and during his funeral, a new star appears next to Evangeline.
        Tiana and Naveen are married by Mama Odie and, because of Tiana's new status as a princess, are both restored to human form after their kiss. Later they return to New Orleans to legally marry and celebrate and open their new restaurant, with Louis playing in the band.
        Cast and characters Anika Noni Rose as Tiana, an African American 19-year-old waitress and aspiring chef / restaurateur. She is an intelligent, hardworking and independent young woman, but works so hard that she often forgets about important things such as love, fun and family.[6]Bruno Campos as Prince Naveen, the prince of Maldonia. Naveen is a 20-year-old musician and playboy who has been cut off from his family's riches until he learns the value of responsibility. Randy Haycock served as the supervising animator of Naveen in both human and frog form.[7]Dr. Facilier being performed by a cast member at Disneyland
        Keith David as Dr. Facilier, also known as the Shadow Man, a voodoo bokor (witch doctor) who plans to rule New Orleans with help from his "friends on the other side". He is depicted in the image of Baron Samedi and/or Ghede Nibo wearing a tailcoat and tophat. Bruce W. Smith, supervising animator of Doctor Facilier, referred to the character as the "lovechild" of his two favorite Disney Villains: Captain Hook from Peter Pan (1953), and Cruella de Vil from One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961).[8] Smith was nominated for the Annie Award for Character Animation in a Feature Production for his work.[9]Michael-Leon Wooley as Louis, a friendly, yet neurotic, obese trumpet-playing alligator whose dream is to become human so he can join a jazz band. His name comes from the famous jazz artist and trumpeter, Louis Armstrong. Eric Goldberg, the supervising animator of Louis and other miscellaneous characters,[7] won the Annie Award for Character Animation in a Feature Production for his work on the film.[9]Jim Cummings as Ray, a middle aged Cajun firefly. He and his vast family are close friends with Mama Odie, so he offers to help the frogs get to her. Ray has an unrequited love for the Evening Star, which he believes is another firefly named "Evangeline" (a reference to the 19th-century Longfellow poem). Mike Surrey was the supervising animator for Ray. Ray's name comes from the blind pianist Ray Charles.[7]Jennifer Cody as Charlotte "Lottie" La Bouff, a 19-year-old wealthy Southern d(C)butante and Tiana's best friend since childhood who dreams of marrying a prince. Though she is initially spoiled and self-centered, she has a heart of gold and cares deeply for Tiana's well-being, going as far as giving up her chance to be a princess when she sees that Prince Naveen and Tiana are truly in love. Nik Ranieri served as the supervising animator of Charlotte as an adult and child.[7] Jennifer Cody won the Annie Award for Voice Acting in a Feature Production for her performance.[9]John Goodman as Eli "Big Daddy" La Bouff, a very wealthy Southern sugar mill owner and father of Charlotte La Bouff. While he spoils Charlotte with everything she asks for, he is a loving and generous man, and loves Tiana's cooking. Duncan Marjoribanks was the supervising animator for La Bouff.[7]Jenifer Lewis as Mama Odie, a blind, 197-year-old voodoo priestess, who serves as the film's "Fairy Godmother figure". Andreas Deja was the supervising animator for both Mama Odie and her pet snake, Juju, and was nominated for the Annie Award for Character Animation in a Feature Production.[9][11]Peter Bartlett as Lawrence, Prince Naveen's valet, whom Doctor Facilier recruits as a partner in his scheme by transforming him to look like Naveen using a blood charm. Anthony DeRosa was the supervising animator for the Lawrence character, whose design was influenced by the Mr. Smee character from Peter Pan.Oprah Winfrey as Eudora, Tiana's mother who wants to see her happy and worries that Tiana focuses too much on her dream of owning a restaurant.[12] Ruben A. Aquino animated both Eudora and her husband, James.[7]Terrence Howard as James, Tiana's father, who helped instill a strong work ethic in Tiana. He served in World War I as evidenced by a dresser-top portrait photo of him in a World War I uniform. The circumstances of his death were not stated in the film; however, his portrait is accompanied by the Distinguished Service Cross, a US medal awarded to soldiers who demonstrated great heroism or risk of life in battle.Frank Welker as Stella, Charlotte's pet basset hound who talks to Tiana during the film, when she is chasing Tiana and Naveen as frogs on the table. She loves Tiana's beignets and begs at Tiana when she wants one.Dee Bradley Baker as Juju, Mama Odie's pet snake.Corey Burton and Jerry Kernion as the Fenner Brothers, two real estate agents who eventually sell Tiana the sugar mill under duress after initially refusing because someone else was offering to pay for it in cash, and because they believed Tiana could not manage it because of her background.[13]Ritchie Montgomery, Don Hall, and Paul Briggs as Reggie, Darnell, and Two-Fingers, three bumbling frog hunters who try to catch Tiana and Naveen as frogs. Their resemblance to The Three Stooges has been noted.Kevin Michael Richardson and Emeril Lagasse as Ian and Marlon, two of a congregation of wild and hot-tempered alligators who try to eat Tiana and Naveen as frogs.Production Early development Disney had once announced that 2004's Home on the Range would be their last traditionally animated film. After the company's acquisition of Pixar in 2006, Ed Catmull and John Lasseter, the new president and chief creative officer of Disney Animation Studios, reversed this decision and reinstated hand-drawn animation at the studio.[14][15] Many animators who had either been laid off or had left the studio when the traditional animation units were dissolved in 2003 were located and re-hired for the project.[16] Lasseter also brought back directors Ron Clements and John Musker, whose earlier works include The Great Mouse Detective (1986), The Little Mermaid (1989), Aladdin (1992), Hercules (1997), and Treasure Planet (2002).[17][18] The duo had left the company in 2005, but Lasseter requested their return to Disney to direct and write the film and had let them choose the style of animation (traditional or CGI) they wanted to use.
        The story for the film began development by merging two projects in development at Disney and Pixar at the time, both based around "The Frog Prince" fairy tale.[16] One of the projects was based on E. D. Baker's The Frog Princess, in which the story's heroine (Princess Emma) kisses a prince turned frog (Prince Eadric), only to become a frog herself.[16] Jorgen Klubien also believes that a story he was working on at Pixar, called "The Spirit of New Orleans, a Pixar Ghost Story", served as inspiration for the movie.[19] The Princess and the Frog returns to the musical film format used in many of the previously successful Disney animated films, with a style Musker and Clements declared, like with Aladdin and The Little Mermaid, had inspiration from Golden Age Disney features such as Cinderella.[20]
        Musker and Clements thought that given so many fairy tales were set in Europe, they could do an American fairy tale.[20] They stated that they chose New Orleans as a tribute to the history of the city, for its "magical" qualities, and because it was Lasseter's favorite city.[21] The directors spent ten days in Louisiana before starting to write the film.[20]
        The Princess and the Frog was originally announced as The Frog Princess in July 2006,[14] and early concepts and songs were presented to the public at The Walt Disney Company's annual shareholders' meeting in March 2007. These announcements drew criticism from African-American media outlets, due to elements of the Frog Princess story, characters, and settings considered distasteful.[23][24] African-American critics disapproved of the original name for the heroine, "Maddy", due to its similarity to the derogatory term "mammy".[23] Also protested were Maddy's original career as a chambermaid,[24] the choice to have the Black heroine's love interest be a non-Black prince,[23] and the use of a Black male voodoo witchdoctor as the film's villain.[23] The Frog Princess title was also thought by critics to be a slur on French people.[25] Also questioned was the film's setting of New Orleans, which had been heavily damaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, resulting in the expulsion of a large number of mostly Black residents.[26] Critics claimed the choice of New Orleans as the setting for a Disney film with a Black heroine was an affront to the Katrina victims' plight.[23][26]
        In response to these early criticisms, the film's title was changed in May 2007 from The Frog Princess to The Princess and the Frog. The name "Maddy" was changed to "Tiana",[25][27] and the character's occupation was altered from chambermaid to waitress.[23] Talk show host Oprah Winfrey was hired as a technical consultant for the film, leading to her taking a voice-acting role in the film as Tiana's mother, Eudora.
        Writing and themes The head of story, Don Hall, described the plot as a fairy tale "twisted enough that it seems new and fresh", with a kingdom that is a modern city, a handsome prince that is a "knuckleheaded playboy" and a variation on the fairy godmother with Mama Odie. Co-writer Rob Edwards also said The Princess and the Frog was "a princess movie for people who don't like princess movies". As the writers thought Tiana's character motivation of simply dreaming of having her own restaurant was not appealing enough, they expanded so it was her father's as well, with the extra philosophy of "food bringing people together from all walks of life". Musker and Clements stated that while Tiana already starts as a sympathetic character, the events of the plot make her "understand things in a deeper level" and change people around her. Both protagonists would learn from each other'--Naveen to take responsibilities, Tiana to enjoy life'--as well as figuring from Ray's passion for Evangeline that the perfect balance is brought by having someone you love to share the experience.[20] Tiana became the first African-American Disney Princess.[28][29]
        Tiana was inspired in part by famed restaurateur Leah Chase, who Clements and Musker met on their research trip to New Orleans.[30] Clements elaborated, "There's a woman in New Orleans named Lee (sic) Chase who was a waitress and ultimately opened a restaurant with her husband '... we met with her and we talked with her and she went to kind of into her story, her philosophy about food, which is a big element of the movie."[31]
        Voice cast On December 1, 2006, a detailed casting call was announced for the film at the Manhattan Theatre Source forum.[32] The casting call states the film as being an American fairy tale musical set in New Orleans during the 1926 Jazz Age and provides a detailed list of the film's major characters.
        In February 2007, it was reported that Dreamgirls actresses Jennifer Hudson and Anika Noni Rose were top contenders for the voice of Tiana, and that Alicia Keys directly contacted Walt Disney Studios chairman Dick Cook about voicing the role.[33] It was later reported that Tyra Banks was considered for the role as well.[34] By April 2007, it was confirmed that Rose would be voicing Tiana.[35] Three months later, it was reported that Keith David would be doing the voice of Doctor Facilier, the villain of the film.[36]
        Animation and design Clements and Musker had agreed early on that the style they were aiming for was primarily that of Lady and the Tramp (1955), a film which they and John Lasseter feel represents "the pinnacle of Disney's style".[37] "After that, everything started becoming more stylized, like Sleeping Beauty, 101 Dalmatians'--which are fantastic films as well, but there's a particular style (to Lady and the Tramp) that's so classically Disney."[38] Lady and the Tramp also heavily informed the style of the New Orleans scenes, while Disney's Bambi (1942) served as the template for the bayou scenes.[37] Bambi was described as a stylistic reference for the painted backgrounds, as according to art director Ian Gooding "Bambi painted what it feels like to be in the forest instead of the forest" so The Princess and the Frog would in turn try capturing the essence of roaming through New Orleans.[20]
        The former trend in Disney's hand-drawn features where the characters and cinematography were influenced by a CGI-look had been abandoned. Andreas Deja, a veteran Disney animator who supervised the character of Mama Odie, says "I always thought that maybe we should distinguish ourselves to go back to what 2D is good at, which is focusing on what the line can do rather than volume, which is a CG kind of thing. So we are doing less extravagant Treasure Planet kind of treatments. You have to create a world but [we're doing it more simply]. What we're trying to do with Princess and the Frog is hook up with things that the old guys did earlier. It's not going to be graphic'...".[39] Deja also mentions that Lasseter was aiming for the Disney sculptural and dimensional look of the 1950s: "All those things that were non-graphic, which means go easy on the straight lines and have one volume flow into the other'--an organic feel to the drawing."[39] Lasseter also felt that traditional animation created more character believability.[40] For example, with Louis the alligator, created by Eric Goldberg, Lasseter said: "It's the believability of this large character being able to move around quite like that."[40] Choreographer Betsy Baytos was brought by the directors to lead a team of eccentric dancers that gave reference to make each character a different style of movement. The character design tried to create beautiful drawings through subtle shapes, particularly for most characters being human. For the frog versions of Tiana and Naveen, while the animators started with realistic designs, they eventually went for cutesy characters "removing all that is unappealing in frogs", similar to Pinocchio ' s Jiminy Cricket.[20]
        Toon Boom Animation's Toon Boom Harmony software was used as the main software package for the production of the film, as the Computer Animation Production System (CAPS) system that Disney developed with Pixar in the 1980s for use on their previous traditionally animated films had become outdated by 2004.[41] The Harmony software was augmented with a number of plug-ins to provide CAPS-like effects such as shading on cheeks and smoke effects.[11][39] The reinstated traditional unit's first production, a 2007 Goofy cartoon short entitled How to Hook Up Your Home Theater, was partly animated without paper by using Harmony and Wacom Cintiq pressure-sensitive tablets. The character animators found some difficulty with this approach, and decided to use traditional paper and pencil drawings, which were then scanned into the computer systems, for The Princess and the Frog.[11]
        The one exception to the new Toon Boom Harmony pipeline was the "Almost There" dream sequence, which utilized an Art Deco graphic style based on the art of Harlem Renaissance painter Aaron Douglas.[42] Supervised by Eric Goldberg and designed by Sue Nichols,[43] the "Almost There" sequence's character animation was done on paper without going through the clean-up animation department, and scanned directly into Photoshop. The artwork was then enhanced to affect the appearance of painted strokes and fills, and combined with backgrounds, using Adobe After Effects.[8][11]
        The visual effects and backgrounds for the film were created digitally using Cintiq tablet displays.[11][44] Marlon West, one of Disney's veteran animation visual effects supervisors, says about the production; "Those guys had this bright idea to bring back hand-drawn animation, but everything had to be started again from the ground up. One of the first things we did was focus on producing shorts, to help us re-introduce the 2D pipeline. I worked as vfx supervisor on the Goofy short, How to Hook Up Your Home Theater. It was a real plus for the effects department, so we went paperless for The Princess and the Frog." The backgrounds were painted digitally using Adobe Photoshop, and many of the architectural elements were based upon 3D models built in Autodesk Maya.[11] Much of the clean-up animation, digital ink-and-paint, and compositing were outsourced to third-party companies in Orlando, Florida (Premise Entertainment), Toronto, Ontario, Canada (Yowza! Animation), and Brooklin, S£o Paulo, Brazil (HGN Produ§µes).[7]
        Music Originally, Alan Menken was considered to be in charge of the soundtrack. However, Lasseter thought that since Menken scored the Disney film Enchanted (2007), the music might be too repetitive, especially the fact that some previous Renaissance Disney animated films technically had other songwriters (particularly The Lion King, Mulan, and Tarzan). Lasseter realized that Randy Newman, whom he had previously worked with, was the perfect choice for the film and replaced Menken with him, due to the fact that Newman is a jazz composer and grew up in New Orleans, making him compatible with the project´s musical setting that is based on. Newman had also written the songs for another broadway-style musical 2D animated feature, Warner Bros.' Cats Don't Dance (1997), and had written the songs for Toy Story (1995).
        During Disney's 2007 shareholder meeting, Randy Newman and the Dirty Dozen Brass Band performed the film's opening number, "Down in New Orleans", with famous New Orleans singer Dr. John singing, while slides of pre-production art from the film played on a screen. Other songs in the film include "Almost There" (a solo for Tiana), "Dig a Little Deeper" (a song for Mama Odie), "When We're Human" (a song for Louis, Tiana and Naveen [as frogs]), "Friends on the Other Side" (a solo for Doctor Facilier), and "Gonna Take You There" and "Ma Belle Evangeline" (two solos for Ray). Newman composed, arranged, and conducted the music for the film, a mixture of jazz, zydeco, blues, and gospel styles performed by the voice cast members for the respective characters while R&B singer-songwriter Ne-Yo wrote and performed the end title song "Never Knew I Needed", an R&B love song referring to the romance between the film's two main characters, Tiana and Naveen. Supported by a music video by Melina, "Never Knew I Needed" was issued to radio outlets as a commercial single from the Princess and the Frog soundtrack.[45]
        The film's soundtrack album, The Princess and the Frog: Original Songs and Score, contains the ten original songs from the film and seven instrumental pieces. The soundtrack was released on November 23, 2009, the day before the limited release of the film in New York and Los Angeles.[46]
        Release The film premiered in theaters with a limited run in New York and Los Angeles beginning on November 25, 2009, followed by wide release on December 11, 2009.[47] The film was originally set for release on Christmas Day 2009, but its release date was changed due to a competing family film from Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, scheduled for release the same day.[48] The Princess and the Frog enjoyed a limited re-release in AMC Theatres, lasting from October 6''12, 2017 as part of the Dream Big, Princess campaign.[49][50]
        Marketing The Princess and the Frog was supported by a wide array of merchandise leading up to and following the film's release. Although Disney's main marketing push was not set to begin until November 2009, positive word-of-mouth promotion created demand for merchandise well in advance of the film.[51] Princess Tiana costumes were selling out prior to Halloween 2009, and a gift set of Tiana-themed hair-care products from Carol's Daughter sold out in seven hours on the company's website.[51] Other planned merchandise includes a cookbook for children and even a wedding gown.[51] Princess Tiana was also featured a few months before the release in the Disney on Ice: Let's Celebrate! show.[52] The film itself was promoted through advertisements, including one from GEICO where Naveen, as a frog, converses with the company's gecko mascot.[53]
        A live parade and show called Tiana's Showboat Jubilee! premiered on October 25, 2009, at the Magic Kingdom theme park at Walt Disney World Resort in Florida,[54] and on November 5 at Disneyland in California.[55] In Disneyland, actors in New Orleans Square paraded to the Rivers of America and boarded the park's steamboat.[55] From there, the cast, starring Princess Tiana, Prince Naveen, Louis the alligator, and Doctor Facilier, would sing songs from the movie, following a short storyline taking place after the events of the film. The Disneyland version's actors actually partook in singing, while the Walt Disney World rendition incorporated lip-syncing.[55]
        Tiana's Showboat Jubilee! ran at both parks until January 3, 2010.[54][55] At Disneyland Park, the show was replaced by a land-based event called Princess Tiana's Mardi Gras Celebration, which features Princess Tiana along with five of the original presentation's "Mardi Gras dancers" and the park's "Jambalaya Jazz Band" as they perform songs from the movie.[56] "Tiana's Mardi Gras Celebration" officially ended on October 3, 2010. However, it returned to Disneyland from 2011''2013 as part of the "Limited Time Magic" family-fun weekends.[57][58][59]
        Tiana also appears in Disneyland Paris' New Generation Festival.[60] Some of the characters appear frequently during World of Color, the nightly fountain and projection show presented at Disney California Adventure. Disney announced on June 4, 2009, that they would release a video game inspired by the film and it was released on November 2009 exclusively for Wii and Nintendo DS platforms. It has been officially described an "adventure through the exciting world of New Orleans in a family-oriented video game", featuring events from the film and challenges for Princess Tiana.[61]
        Reception Box office On its limited day release, the film grossed $263,890 at two theaters and grossed $786,190 its opening weekend.[62][63] On its opening day in wide release, the film grossed $7 million at 3,434 theaters.[64] It went on to gross $24.2 million over the opening weekend averaging $7,050 per theater,[65] ranking at #1 for the weekend, and making it the highest-grossing start to date for an animated movie in December, a record previously held by Beavis and Butt-Head Do America.[66] The film went on to gross $104.4 million (in the United States and Canada) and over $270 million (worldwide), making it a box office success, and became the fifth-highest-grossing animated film of 2009.[1] While the film out-grossed Disney's more recent hand-drawn films such as The Emperor's New Groove, Atlantis: The Lost Empire, Treasure Planet, Brother Bear, and Home on the Range, it was less auspicious than the animated films from Walt Disney Animation Studios' 1990s heyday, despite having a similar successful start compared to The Little Mermaid. Disney animator Tom Sito compared the film's box office performance to that of The Great Mouse Detective (1986), which was a step up from the theatrical run of the 1985 box office bomb The Black Cauldron.[67] It can be considered that the film, despite having been a box office hit in general, was unexpectedly overshadowed by the release of James Cameron's Avatar a week later after its release.
        Critical reception Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported the film has an 85% approval rating based on 200 reviews, with an average rating of 7.40/10. The site's general consensus is that "The warmth of traditional Disney animation makes this occasionally lightweight fairy-tale update a lively and captivating confection for the holidays."[68] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 73 out of 100 based on 29 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[69]
        Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly gave the film an "A" grade and applauded the film's creative team for "uphold[ing] the great tradition of classic Disney animation".[70] Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter praised Walt Disney Animation for "rediscovering its traditional hand-drawn animation" and for "a thing called story".[71] David Germain of the Associated Press wrote that "The Princess and the Frog is not the second coming of Beauty and the Beast or The Lion King. It's just plain pleasant, an old-fashioned little charmer that's not straining to be the next glib animated compendium of pop-culture flotsam."[72]
        Justin Chang of Variety was less receptive, stating "this long-anticipated throwback to a venerable house style never comes within kissing distance of the studio's former glory".[73] Joe Neumaier of the New York Daily News gave the film three stars out of five stars while saying "The Princess and the Frog breaks the color barrier for Disney princesses, but is a throwback to traditional animation and her story is a retread".[74] Village Voice ' s Scott Foundas found that "the movie as a whole never approache[d] the wit, cleverness, and storytelling brio of the studio's early-1990s animation renaissance (Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King) or pretty much anything by Pixar".[75] Betsy Sharkey, formerly of the Los Angeles Times, gave the film a positive review claiming: "With The Princess and the Frog they've gotten just about everything right. The dialogue is fresh-prince clever, the themes are ageless, the rhythms are riotous and the return to a primal animation style is beautifully executed."[76]
        Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars and admired Disney's step back to traditional animation, writing, "No 3-D! No glasses! No extra ticket charge! No frantic frenzies of meaningless action! And'...good gravy! A story! Characters! A plot! This is what classic animation once was like!", but stated that the film "inspires memories of Disney's Golden Age it doesn't quite live up to, as I've said, but it's spritely and high-spirited, and will allow kids to enjoy it without visually assaulting them."[77] S. Jhoanna Robledo of Common Sense Media gave the film three out of five stars, writing, "First African-American Disney princess is a good role model".[78] Saint Bryan of the NBC-TV Seattle praised the film and called it "The Best Disney Movie Since The Lion King".[79]
        Upon its release, the film created controversy among some Christians over its use of Louisiana Voodoo as a plot device.[80] Christianity Today ' s review of the film cited its sexual undertones and use of voodoo, arguing that the scenes with Dr. Facilier and his "friends on the other side" contain many horror elements and that young children might be frightened by the film.[81] The film's treatment of Louisiana voodoo as a type of magic instead of a religion also drew criticism from non-Christian factions.[82]
        Awards and nominations The film was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and twice for the Academy Award for Best Original Song, but lost to Up and Crazy Heart, respectively.[4][83] It was also nominated for eight Annie Awards and, at the 37th Annie Awards Ceremony on February 6, 2010, won three.[9]
        Home media The Princess and the Frog was released in North America on DVD and Blu-ray on March 16, 2010.[95]
        The film is available on DVD, Blu-ray, and Blu-ray combo pack editions. The combo pack includes the DVD, Digital Copy, and Blu-ray of the film.[95] The DVD edition has sold over 4.5 million copies and has made $71.8 million in DVD sales,[96] making it the ninth-best-selling DVD of 2010.[97] As of 2019, the film had earned $119 million from its home media releases.[3] The Princess and the Frog was released on 4K Blu-ray on November 5, 2019.[98]
        Impact, aftermath, debates, and legacy While being technically a commercial and critical success in general, the company originally considered releasing at least one hand-drawn animated film every two years,[99] starting with Winnie the Pooh (2011), and an adaptation of "The Snow Queen", which was later switched to CGI (although in the same visual style of Tangled by blending elements of the two media) due to complex visual elements in the story and later re-titled as Frozen released in 2013.
        The blog website /Film noted in July 2014 with the release of hand-drawn concept art for Frozen (which grossed over US$1 billion worldwide), that any future hand-drawn animated films have been "killed" for the time being due to The Princess and the Frog failing "to ignite the box office".[100] Two months later, however, many Disney artists announced they were working on a new independent hand-drawn animated film, Hullabaloo, as part of an attempt to bring back hand-drawn animation,[101] consisting in three short films, while others got later involved on making the Netflix animated film Klaus, released in 2019.
        Looking back on the experience four years later, Catmull acknowledged that Disney had made a "serious mistake" in the process of marketing and releasing the film.[102] Walt Disney Studios' marketing department had warned Disney Animation that the word "princess" in the title "would lead moviegoers to think that the film was for girls only," but the animation studio's management insisted on keeping the "princess" title because they believed that the film's quality and hand-drawn animation would bring in all quadrants anyway.[102] In Catmull's words, this belief "was our own version of a stupid pill."[102] The marketing department turned out to be correct in their prediction that many moviegoers would and did avoid the film because they thought it was "for little girls only."[102] This error was further compounded by the fact that the film opened a week before Avatar.[102]
        Looking back on the experience seven years later, Lasseter told Variety: "I was determined to bring back [hand-drawn animation] because I felt it was such a heritage of the Disney studio, and I love the art form '... I was stunned that Princess didn't do better. We dug into it and did a lot of research and focus groups. It was viewed as old-fashioned by the audience."[103]
        Despite the absence of traditional animated feature films after the release of Winnie the Pooh, Disney Animation has been using both media for the sake of experimenting with new techniques and styles. In 2019, after Lasseter's exit from the studio and Jennifer Lee as the new chief creative officer of the animation facility the previous year, she, along with producer Peter Del Vecho and director Chris Buck confirmed that making another 2D animated film is still possible, and that the different styles are driven by the filmmakers who chose what to use to tell their stories in the right way.[104]
        Upcoming theme park ride In June 2020, Disney announced that the Splash Mountain theme park attraction, which is themed to the controversial film Song of the South (1946), would be rethemed to The Princess and the Frog in Disneyland and Magic Kingdom, which was stated to have had been in development since 2019. The announcement came amid the ongoing George Floyd protests and online petitions to change the theme of Splash Mountain.[105][106] The New York Times reported that Disney executives had been privately discussing removing the attraction's Song of the South theme for at least five years, before putting into development the Princess and the Frog theme.[107]
        The attraction's storyline will take place after the events of the film, and will involve Tiana and Louis preparing for a Mardi Gras performance.[105]
        Upcoming television series In December 2020, Disney announced a television spin-off titled Tiana will be released on Disney+ in 2022.[108][109] It will be among the first spin-offs of a Walt Disney Animation Studios film to be produced by the studio itself rather than Disney Television Animation.
        In other media Tiana made a guest-appearance on Sofia the First in the second-season episode "Winter's Gift".[110]Tiana, Prince Naveen, Eudora and Dr. Facilier appear on the seventh season of Once Upon a Time. Maldonia also appears as a realm in New Fairy Tale Land.[111][112][113][114]Tiana is featured in the 2018 film Ralph Breaks the Internet, alongside all the other Disney Princesses.[115] However, initial images from the film showed that her appearance had been changed to give Tiana a lighter skin tone, a narrower nose, and European features.[116][117] This led to several backlashes from the viewers on social media as these drew her appearance away from that expected of African-Americans.[117][118] Because of this, Disney contacted Anika Noni Rose and the advocacy group Color of Change to redesign Tiana for Ralph Breaks the Internet to make sure that she resembles more closely to her actual appearance, which was revealed in the second trailer.[117][118][119]Dr. Facilier appears in the Disney Channel original film Descendants 3, played by Jamal Sims.[120]See also List of animated feature-length filmsList of traditional animated feature filmsList of Disney theatrical animated featuresList of Disney animated films based on fairy talesReferences ^ a b c "The Princess and the Frog (2009) '' Box Office Mojo". Box Office Mojo. IMDb . Retrieved July 18, 2010 . ^ Wigler, Josh (December 14, 2009). " ' The Princess And The Frog' Leaps Over The Competition At The Box Office". MTV. Viacom . Retrieved January 22, 2010 . [...]cost Disney $105 million to produce[...] ^ a b "The Princess and the Frog (2009)". The Numbers. Nash Information Services . Retrieved July 18, 2010 . ^ a b c " " The Hurt Locker" Takes Top Honors at 82nd Academy Awards". playbill.com. Playbill. March 8, 2010 . Retrieved February 1, 2015 . ^ Lacey, Liam (December 10, 2009). "The Princess and the Frog". The Globe and Mail. Archived from the original on June 20, 2018 . Retrieved November 1, 2018 . ^ Tucker, Neely (April 16, 2009). "A fairy tale beginning: Snow White, she is not. Among the royal ladies of Disney, Tiana is a prominent first". The Washington Post . Retrieved May 25, 2010 . ^ a b c d e f g "Academy Awards press kit for The Princess and the Frog" (PDF) . Disney Enterprises, Inc. 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Retrieved November 1, 2009 . ^ "Disney On Ice Presents Let's Celebrate!". ABC7 News. ABC Inc., WLS-TV/DT Chicago, IL. January 22, 2010 . Retrieved May 17, 2010 . ^ Marcucci, Carl (November 13, 2009). "GEICO Gecko teams with "The Princess and the Frog " ". Radio and Television Business Report. Archived from the original on February 22, 2018 . Retrieved February 22, 2018 . ^ a b Mongello, Lou (October 26, 2009). "First Look '' Tiana's Showboat Jubilee at Walt Disney World Videos". WDW Radio. Archived from the original on January 26, 2012 . Retrieved February 16, 2018 . ^ a b c d MacDonald, Brady (November 5, 2009). "First look: 'Tiana's Showboat Jubilee' opens at Disneyland for a limited run". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on December 9, 2009 . Retrieved February 17, 2018 . ^ "Princess Tiana's Mardi Gras Celebration". Disneyland Park official website. Disney Enterprises, Inc. Archived from the original on May 27, 2010 . 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Box Office Mojo . Retrieved November 29, 2009 . ^ "Daily Box Office for Friday, December 11, 2009". Box Office Mojo . Retrieved December 11, 2009 . ^ "Weekend Box Office Results for December 11''13, 2009". Box Office Mojo . Retrieved December 15, 2009 . ^ Gray, Brandon (December 14, 2009). "Weekend Report: 'Princess and the Frog' Leaps to the Top". Box Office Mojo . Retrieved December 15, 2009 . ^ "Disney seeks to crown revival with 'Frozen' Oscar gold". National Media . Retrieved June 22, 2014 . ^ "The Princess and the Frog". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media . Retrieved December 11, 2020 . ^ "The Princess and the Frog: Reviews". Metacritic . Retrieved December 17, 2009 . ^ Schwarzbaum, Lisa (November 24, 2009). "The Princess and the Frog Movie Review". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved November 27, 2009 . ^ Honeycutt, Kirk (November 24, 2009). "The Princess and the Frog '' Film Review". The Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved June 30, 2014 . ^ Germain, David (December 11, 2009). "Hand-drawn animation jumps again with Disney's 'Frog ' ". Billings Gazette. Associated Press . Retrieved December 11, 2020 . ^ Chang, Justin (November 24, 2009). "The Princess and the Frog Movie Review". Variety . Retrieved November 27, 2009 . ^ Neumaier, Joe (November 24, 2009). "Disney's first black princess mark the studio's return to old-style animation". New York Daily News . Retrieved November 27, 2009 . ^ Foundas, Scott (November 24, 2009). "Disney's Princess and the Frog Can't Escape the Ghetto". Village Voice . Retrieved November 27, 2009 . ^ Sharkey, Betsy (November 25, 2009). "Review: 'The Princess and the Frog ' ". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved November 27, 2009 . ^ Ebert, Roger (December 9, 2009). "The Princess and the Frog review". Chicago Sun Times . Retrieved December 12, 2009 '' via RogerEbert.com. ^ S. Jhoanna Robledo (March 16, 2010). "The Princess and the Frog '' Movie Review". commonsensemedia.org . Retrieved May 27, 2012 . ^ Bryan, Saint (January 26, 2010). "The Princess and the Frog released on Blu-Ray and DVD March 16th". ^ Pinsky, Mike I. (July 1, 2010). "What Walt Wrought". The Wall Street Journal. ^ Young Frisbie, Annie (November 25, 2009). "The Princess and the Frog review". Christianity Today. ^ Maldonado, Michelle Gonzales (February 4, 2010). "# # Bad Magic: Voodoo According to Disney". Religion Dispatches . Retrieved May 17, 2010 . ^ a b "Oscar nominations announced: 'Avatar,' 'Hurt Locker' lead with nine each". ew.com. 2010. Archived from the original on February 5, 2010 . Retrieved February 2, 2010 . ^ International Press Academy (December 2009). "2009 14th Annual Satellite Awards Nominations". PressAcademys.com. Archived from the original on October 8, 2011 . Retrieved December 8, 2009 . ^ Rae (January 5, 2010). "Producers Guild Of America Announces Best Produced Motion Picture, Animated Motion Picture, And Documentary Motion Picture Nominations For The 2010 PGA Awards". ProducersGuild.org . 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"Frozen Concept Art Shows What A Hand Drawn Movie Could've Looked Like". /Film . Retrieved July 2, 2014 . ^ Brigante, Ricky (September 1, 2014). "Disney animators aim to revive 2D hand-drawn animation with "Hullabaloo," an independent animated steampunk project". Inside the Magic . Retrieved September 2, 2014 . ^ a b c d e Catmull, Ed; Amy Wallace (2014). Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration . New York: Random House. p. 268. ISBN 978-0812993011. ^ Debruge, Peter (November 22, 2016). "Disney's Pixar Acquisition: Bob Iger's Bold Move That Reanimated a Studio". Variety . Retrieved January 24, 2017 . ^ Pearson, Ben (September 30, 2019). "Walt Disney Animation Isn't Opposed to Hand-Drawn Features, Jennifer Lee Talks About Making Changes After John Lasseter's Exit [Interview]". /Film. ^ a b Ramirez, Michael (June 25, 2020). "New Adventures with Princess Tiana Coming to Disneyland Park and Magic Kingdom Park". Disney Parks Blog . 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"Disney Reanimates Portions of Upcoming Film After Criticism for Lightening Black Character's Skin". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on October 1, 2018 . Retrieved February 2, 2019 . ^ a b Milligan, Mercedes (September 23, 2018). "Disney Reanimates 'Ralph's Tiana After Colorism Criticism". Animation Magazine. Archived from the original on September 26, 2018 . Retrieved November 1, 2018 . ^ Gutierrez, Lisa (September 27, 2018). "Anika Noni Rose goes to bat for Princess Tiana after Disney lightens her skin tone". The Kansas City Star. Archived from the original on September 28, 2018 . Retrieved November 1, 2018 . ^ Maureen Lee Lenker (May 4, 2018). "Descendants 3 casts The Princess and the Frog's Dr. Facilier and his daughter". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved June 25, 2020 . Bibliography External links Official website The Princess and the Frog at AllMovieThe Princess and the Frog at The Big Cartoon DataBaseThe Princess and the Frog at IMDbThe Princess and the Frog at Box Office MojoThe Princess and the Frog at Rotten Tomatoes
      Hugo Black - Wikipedia
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:00
        United States Supreme Court justice
        Hugo Black
        In office August 18, 1937 '' September 17, 1971[1] Nominated by Franklin D. Roosevelt Preceded by Willis Van Devanter Succeeded by Lewis F. Powell Jr. In office January 3, 1937 '' August 19, 1937 Preceded by David Walsh Succeeded by Elbert Thomas In office 1927''1937LeaderJoseph Taylor Robinson Preceded by William H. King Succeeded by Joshua B. Lee In office March 4, 1927 '' August 19, 1937 Preceded by Oscar Underwood Succeeded by Dixie GravesBornHugo Lafayette Black
        ( 1886-02-27 ) February 27, 1886Harlan, Alabama, U.S.Died September 25, 1971 (1971-09-25) (aged 85) Bethesda, Maryland, U.S.Political partyDemocraticSpouse(s)Josephine Foster
        '‹
        '‹
        (
        m. 1921; died 1951)
        '‹
        Elizabeth DeMeritte
        '‹
        (
        m. 1957)
        '‹
        Children3, including Hugo and SterlingEducationAshland CollegeUniversity of Alabama, BirminghamUniversity of Alabama, Tuscaloosa (LLB)
        Allegiance United StatesBranch/service United States ArmyYears of service1917''1919Rank CaptainUnit81st Field Artillery RegimentBattles/warsWorld War I[2]Hugo Lafayette Black (February 27, 1886 '' September 25, 1971) was an American lawyer, politician, and jurist who served as a U.S. Senator from 1927 to 1937 and as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1937 to 1971. A member of the Democratic Party and a devoted New Dealer,[3] Black endorsed Franklin D. Roosevelt in both the 1932 and 1936 presidential elections.[4] Having gained a reputation in the Senate as a reformer, Black was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Roosevelt and confirmed by the Senate by a vote of 63 to 16 (six Democratic Senators and 10 Republican Senators voted against him). He was the first of nine Roosevelt appointees to the Court,[5] and he outlasted all except for William O. Douglas.[6]
        The fifth longest-serving justice in Supreme Court history, Black was one of the most influential Supreme Court justices in the 20th century. He is noted for his advocacy of a textualist reading of the United States Constitution and of the position that the liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights were imposed on the states ("incorporated") by the Fourteenth Amendment. During his political career, Black was regarded as a staunch supporter of liberal policies and civil liberties.[7]
        During World War II, Black wrote the majority opinion in Korematsu v. United States (1944), which upheld the Japanese-American internment that had taken place. Black opposed the doctrine of substantive due process (the anti-New Deal Supreme Court's interpretation of this concept made it impossible for the government to enact legislation that conservatives claimed interfered with the ostensible freedom of business owners)[4]: 107''108 and believed that there was no basis in the words of the Constitution for a right to privacy, voting against finding one in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965).[4]: 241''242
        Before he became a U.S. Senator (D-AL), Black espoused anti-Catholic views and was a member of the Ku Klux Klan in Alabama, but he resigned in 1925.[8] In 1937, upon being appointed to the Supreme Court, Black said: "Before becoming a Senator I dropped the Klan. I have had nothing to do with it since that time. I abandoned it. I completely discontinued any association with the organization."[9]
        Black served as the Secretary of the Senate Democratic Conference and the Chair of the Senate Education Committee during his decade in the Senate.
        Early years [ edit ] Hugo LaFayette Black was the youngest of the eight children of William Lafayette Black and Martha (Toland) Black. He was born on February 27, 1886, in Harlan, Clay County, Alabama. In 1890 the family moved to Ashland, the county seat.[2]
        Since his brother Orlando had become a medical doctor, Hugo had graduated from the University of Alabama College of Education. Hugo decided at first to follow in his footsteps. At age 22, he left Tuscaloosa and enrolled at University of Alabama School of Medicine in Birmingham. But Orlando suggested that Hugo should instead enroll at the University of Alabama School of Law. After graduating from the University of Alabama Law School in June 1906, he moved back to Ashland and established a legal practice. His practice was not successful there, so Black moved to the growing city of Birmingham in 1907, where he specialized in labor law and personal injury cases.[2]
        As a consequence of his defense of an African American who was forced into a form of commercial slavery after incarceration, Black was befriended by A. O. Lane, a judge connected with the case. When Lane was elected to the Birmingham City Commission in 1911, he asked Black to serve as a police court judge '' his only judicial experience prior to the Supreme Court. In 1912, Black resigned that seat in order to return to practicing law full-time. He was not done with public service; in 1914, he began a four-year term as the Jefferson County Prosecuting Attorney.[2]
        Three years later, during World War I, Black resigned in order to join the United States Army, eventually reaching the rank of captain. He served in the 81st Field Artillery, but was not assigned to Europe.[10] He joined the Birmingham Civitan Club during this time, eventually serving as president of the group.[11] He remained an active member throughout his life, occasionally contributing articles to Civitan publications.[12]
        In the early 1920s, Black became a member of the Robert E. Lee Klan No. 1 in Birmingham, before resigning in 1925.[13] In 1937, after his confirmation to the supreme court, it was reported he had been given a "grand passport" in 1926, granting him life membership to the Ku Klux Klan.[13]
        On February 23, 1921, he married Josephine Foster (1899''1951), with whom he had three children: Hugo L. Black, II (1922''2013), an attorney; Sterling Foster (1924''1996), and Martha Josephine (born 1933). Josephine died in 1951; in 1957, Black married Elizabeth Seay DeMeritte.[14]
        Senate career [ edit ] Black during his Senate tenure
        In 1926, Black sought election to the United States Senate from Alabama, following the retirement of Senator Oscar Underwood. Since the Democratic Party had dominated Alabama politics since disenfranchising most blacks (and Republicans) at the turn of the century, Black easily defeated his Republican opponent, E. H. Dryer, winning 80.9% of the white vote. He was reelected in 1932, winning 86.3% of the vote against Republican J. Theodore Johnson.[15] Senator Black gained a reputation as a tenacious investigator. In 1934, he chaired the committee that looked into the contracts awarded to air mail carriers under Postmaster General Walter Folger Brown, an inquiry which led to the Air Mail scandal. In order to correct what he termed abuses of "fraud and collusion" resulting from the Air Mail Act of 1930, he introduced the Black-McKellar Bill, later the Air Mail Act of 1934. The following year he participated in a Senate committee's investigation of lobbying practices. He publicly denounced the "highpowered, deceptive, telegram-fixing, letterframing, Washington-visiting" lobbyists, and advocated legislation requiring them to publicly register their names and salaries.[16]
        In 1935, during the Great Depression, Black became chairman of the Senate Committee on Education and Labor, a position he would hold for the remainder of his Senate career. On August 8, 1935, Senator Black, who was chairman of the senate committee investigating lobbying activities, went on the National Broadcasting Company's National Radio Forum. The national audience was shocked to hear Black speak of a $5 million electric industry lobbying campaign attempt to defeat the Wheeler-Rayburn bill, known as the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935 that had passed in July. The act directed the Securities and Exchange Commission to close down the country's corrupt electric holding companies. The newspaper article of Black's dramatic speech over what was the largest political battle of its kind in the U.S., running from 1920 to 1960, can be found here.[17]In 1937 he sponsored the Black-Connery Bill, which sought to establish a national minimum wage and a maximum workweek of thirty hours.[18] Although the bill was initially rejected in the House of Representatives, an amended version of it, which extended Black's original maximum workweek proposal to forty-four hours,[18] was passed in 1938 (after Black left the Senate), becoming known as the Fair Labor Standards Act.[18]
        Black was an ardent supporter of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal.[4]: 91 In particular, he was an outspoken advocate of the Judiciary Reorganization Bill of 1937, popularly known as the court-packing bill, FDR's unsuccessful plan to expand the number of seats on the Supreme Court in his favor.[4]: 90''91
        Throughout his career as a senator, Hugo L. Black gave speeches based on his belief in the ultimate power of the Constitution.[4]: 106 He came to see the actions of the anti-New Deal Supreme Court as judicial excess; in his view, the Court was improperly overturning legislation that had been passed by large majorities in Congress.[4][page needed ]
        During his Senate career, Black consistently opposed the passage of anti-lynching legislation, as did all of the white Democrats of the Solid South.[19] In 1935 Black led a filibuster of the Wagner-Costigan anti-lynching bill.[20] The Pittsburgh Post Gazette reported that when a motion to end the filibuster was defeated, "[t]he southerners'--headed by Tom Connally of Texas and Hugo Black of Alabama'--grinned at each other and shook hands."[21]
        Appointment to the Supreme Court [ edit ] 1937 poster protesting Black's appointment as Senator due to his Klan background.
        Soon after the failure of the court-packing plan, President Roosevelt obtained his first opportunity to appoint a Supreme Court Justice when conservative Willis Van Devanter retired. Roosevelt wanted the replacement to be a "thumping, evangelical New Dealer" who was reasonably young, confirmable by the Senate, and from a region of the country unrepresented on the Court.[4]: 90 The three final candidates were Solicitor General Stanley Reed, Sherman Minton, and Hugo Black.[4] Roosevelt said Reed "had no fire," and Minton did not want the appointment at the time.[4][page needed ] The position would go to Black, a candidate from the South, who, as a senator, had voted for all 24 of Roosevelt's major New Deal programs.[4][page needed ] Roosevelt admired Black's use of the investigative role of the Senate to shape the American mind on reforms, his strong voting record, and his early support, which dated back to 1933.[4]: 92 Both Reed and Minton were later appointed to the Supreme Court; Reed was the next Justice appointed by Roosevelt,[22] while Minton was appointed by Harry Truman in 1949.[23]
        On August 12, 1937, Roosevelt nominated Black to fill the vacancy. By tradition, a senator nominated for an executive or judicial office was confirmed immediately and without debate.[4]: 94 However, when Black was nominated, the Senate departed from this tradition for the first time since 1853; instead of confirming him immediately, it referred the nomination to the Judiciary Committee. Black was criticized for his presumed bigotry, his cultural roots, and his Klan membership, when that became public.[4]: 94''95 But Black was a close friend of Walter Francis White, the black executive secretary of the NAACP, who helped assuage critics of the appointment. Chambers v. Florida (1940), an early case where Black ruled in favor of African-American criminal defendants who experienced due process violations, later helped put these concerns to rest.[4]: 104''105
        The Judiciary Committee recommended Black by a vote of 13''4 on August 16,[13] and the full Senate considered his nomination the next day. Rumors of Black's involvement in the Ku Klux Klan surfaced, and two Democratic senators tried defeating the nomination. But no conclusive evidence was available at the time, and after six hours of debate the Senate voted 63''16 to confirm; ten Republicans and six Democrats voted against.[4]: 95 Shortly after, Black's KKK membership became known and there was widespread outrage; nonetheless Black went on to become a prominent champion of civil liberties and civil rights.[24]
        Alabama Governor Bibb Graves appointed his own wife, Dixie B. Graves, to fill Black's vacated senate seat. On Black's first day on the bench, three lawyers contested Black's appointment on the basis of the Ineligibility Clause. The Court dismissed this concern in the same year in Ex parte Levitt.[25]
        Supreme Court career [ edit ] As soon as Black started on the Court, he advocated judicial restraint and worked to move the Court away from interposing itself in social and economic matters. Black vigorously defended the "plain meaning" of the Constitution, rooted in the ideas of its era, and emphasized the supremacy of the legislature; for Black, the role of the Supreme Court was limited and constitutionally prescribed.[4]: 16, 50
        During his early years on the Supreme Court, Black helped reverse several earlier court decisions that were based on a narrow interpretation of federal power. Many New Deal laws that would have been struck down under earlier precedents were thus upheld. In 1939 Black was joined on the Supreme Court by Felix Frankfurter and William O. Douglas. Douglas voted alongside Black in several cases, especially those involving the First Amendment, while Frankfurter soon became one of Black's ideological foes.[26] From 1946 until 1971, Black was the Senior Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.[citation needed ]
        Relationship with other justices [ edit ] Black was involved in a bitter controversy with Justice Robert H. Jackson (shown above).
        In the mid-1940s, Justice Black became involved in a bitter dispute with Justice Robert H. Jackson as a result of Jewell Ridge Coal Corp. v. Local 6167, United Mine Workers (1945). In this case the Court ruled 5''4 in favor of the UMW; Black voted with the majority, while Jackson dissented. However, the coal company requested the Court rehear the case on the grounds that Justice Black should have recused himself, as the mine workers were represented by Black's law partner of 20 years earlier. Under the Supreme Court's rules, each Justice was entitled to determine the propriety of disqualifying himself. Jackson agreed that the petition for rehearing should be denied, but refused to give approval to Black's participation in the case. Ultimately, when the Court unanimously denied the petition for rehearing, Justice Jackson released a short statement, in which Justice Frankfurter joined. The concurrence indicated that Jackson voted to deny the petition not because he approved of Black's participation in the case, but on the "limited grounds" that each Justice was entitled to determine for himself the propriety of recusal.[27][28] At first the case attracted little public comment. However, after Chief Justice Harlan Stone died in 1946, rumors that President Harry S. Truman would appoint Jackson as Stone's successor led several newspapers to investigate and report the Jewell Ridge controversy.[29] Black and Douglas allegedly leaked to newspapers that they would resign if Jackson were appointed Chief.[29] Truman ultimately chose Fred M. Vinson for the position.[citation needed ]
        In 1948, Justice Black approved an order solicited by Abe Fortas that barred a federal district court in Texas from further investigation of significant voter fraud and irregularities in the 1948 Democratic primary election runoff for United States Senator from Texas. The order effectively confirmed future President Lyndon Johnson's apparent victory over former Texas Governor Coke Stevenson.[30][31]
        In the 1960s, Black clashed with Fortas, who by that time had been appointed as an Associate Justice. In 1968, a Warren clerk called their feud "one of the most basic animosities of the Court."[32]
        1950s and beyond [ edit ] Vinson's tenure as Chief Justice coincided with the Second Red Scare, a period of intense anti-communism in the United States. In several cases the Supreme Court considered, and upheld, the validity of anticommunist laws passed during this era. For example, in American Communications Association v. Douds (1950), the Court upheld a law that required labor union officials to forswear membership in the Communist Party. Black dissented, claiming that the law violated the First Amendment's free speech clause. Similarly, in Dennis v. United States, 341 U.S. 494 (1951), the Court upheld the Smith Act, which made it a crime to "advocate, abet, advise, or teach the duty, necessity, desirability, or propriety of overthrowing the Government of the United States." The law was often used to prosecute individuals for joining the Communist Party. Black again dissented, writing:
        Public opinion being what it now is, few will protest the conviction of these Communist petitioners. There is hope, however, that, in calmer times, when present pressures, passions and fears subside, this or some later Court will restore the First Amendment liberties to the high preferred place where they belong in a free society.[33]
        Beginning in the late 1940s, Black wrote decisions relating to the establishment clause, where he insisted on the strict separation of church and state. The most notable of these was Engel v. Vitale (1962), which declared state-sanctioned prayer in public schools unconstitutional. This provoked considerable opposition, especially in conservative circles.[34] Efforts to restore school prayer by constitutional amendment failed.[citation needed ]
        In 1953 Vinson died and was replaced by Earl Warren. While all members of the Court were New Deal liberals, Black was part of the most liberal wing of the Court, together with Warren, Douglas, William Brennan, and Arthur Goldberg. They said the Court had a role beyond that of Congress.[35] Yet while he often voted with them on the Warren Court, he occasionally took his own line on some key cases, most notably Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), which established that the Constitution protected a right to privacy. In not finding such a right implicit in the Constitution, Black wrote in his dissent that "Many good and able men have eloquently spoken and written ... about the duty of this Court to keep the Constitution in tune with the times. ... For myself, I must with all deference reject that philosophy."[4]: 120
        Black's most prominent ideological opponent on the Warren Court was John Marshall Harlan II, who replaced Justice Jackson in 1955. They disagreed on several issues, including the applicability of the Bill of Rights to the states, the scope of the due process clause, and the one man, one vote principle.[citation needed ]
        Black had a number of law clerks who became notable in their own right, including Judges Louis F. Oberdorfer, Truman McGill Hobbs, Guido Calabresi, and Drayton Nabers Jr., Professors John K. McNulty, Stephen Schulhofer, and Walter E. Dellinger III, Mayor David Vann, FCC Commissioner Nicholas Johnson, US Solicitor General Lawrence G. Wallace, and trial lawyer Stephen Susman.[36][37]
        Jurisprudence [ edit ] Black's jurisprudence is among the most distinctive of any members of the Supreme Court in history and has been influential on justices as diverse as Earl Warren,[38][39][40] William Rehnquist,[41] and Antonin Scalia.[42]
        Black's jurisprudence had three essential components: history, literalism, and absolutism.[4]: 109 [43] Black's love of history was rooted in a lifelong love of books,[4]: 110 which led him to the belief that historical study was necessary for one to prevent repeating society's past mistakes.[4][page needed ] Black wrote in 1968 that "power corrupts, and unrestricted power will tempt Supreme Court justices just as history tells us it has tempted other judges."[4]: 119
        Second, Black's commitment to literalism involved using the words of the Constitution to restrict the roles of the judiciary'--Black would have justices validate the supremacy of the country's legislature, unless the legislature itself was denying people their freedoms.[4]: 109 Black wrote: "The Constitution is not deathless; it provides for changing or repealing by the amending process, not by judges but by the people and their chosen representatives."[4]: 123 Black would often lecture his colleagues, liberal or conservative, on the Supreme Court about the importance of acting within the limits of the Constitution.[4][page needed ]
        Third, Black's absolutism led him to enforce the rights of the Constitution, rather than attempting to define a meaning, scope, or extent to each right.[4][page needed ] Black expressed his view on the Bill of Rights in his opinion in the 1947 case, Adamson v. California, which he saw as his "most significant opinion written:"
        I cannot consider the Bill of Rights to be an outworn 18th century 'strait jacket' ... Its provisions may be thought outdated abstractions by some. And it is true that they were designed to meet ancient evils. But they are the same kind of human evils that have emerged from century to century wherever excessive power is sought by the few at the expense of the many. In my judgment the people of no nation can lose their liberty so long as a Bill of Rights like ours survives and its basic purposes are conscientiously interpreted, enforced, and respected ... I would follow what I believe was the original intention of the Fourteenth Amendment'--to extend to all the people the complete protection of the Bill of Rights. To hold that this Court can determine what, if any, provisions of the Bill of Rights will be enforced, and if so to what degree, is to frustrate the great design of a written Constitution.[4]: 120''121
        Judicial restraint [ edit ] Black intensely believed in judicial restraint and reserved the power of making laws to the legislatures, often scolding his more liberal colleagues for what he saw as judicially created legislation. Conservative justice John M. Harlan II would say of Black: "No Justice has worn his judicial robes with a keener sense of the limitations that go with them."[4]: 119 Conservative Judge Robert Bork wrote, "Justice Black came to have significantly more respect for the limits of the Constitution than Justice Douglas and the other leading members of the Warren majorities ever showed."[44] One scholar wrote, "No Justice of the Court conscientiously and persistently endeavored, as much as Justice Black did, to establish consistent standards of objectivity for adjudicating constitutional questions."[45] Black advocated a narrow role of interpretation for justices, opposing a view of justices as social engineers or rewriters of the Constitution. Black opposed enlarging constitutional liberties beyond their literal or historic "plain" meaning, as he saw his more liberal colleagues do.[4]: 119''120 However, he also condemned the actions of those to his right, such as the conservative Four Horsemen of the 1920s and 1930s, who struck down much of the New Deal's legislation.[citation needed ]
        Black forged the 5''4 majority in the 1967 decision Fortson v. Morris, which cleared the path for the Georgia State Legislature to choose the governor in the deadlocked 1966 race between Democrat Lester Maddox and Republican Howard Callaway. Whereas Black voted with the majority under strict construction to uphold the state constitutional provision, his colleagues Douglas (joined by Warren, Brennan, and Fortas) and Fortas (joined by Warren and Douglas) dissented. According to Douglas, Georgia tradition would guarantee a Maddox victory though he had trailed Callaway by some three thousand votes in the general election returns. Douglas also saw the issue as a continuation of the earlier decision Gray v. Sanders, which had struck down Georgia's County Unit System, a kind of electoral college formerly used to choose the governor. Black argued that the U.S. Constitution does not dictate how a state must choose its governor. "Our business is not to write laws to fit the day. Our task is to interpret the Constitution," Black explained.[46]
        Textualism and originalism [ edit ] Black was noted for his advocacy of a textualist approach to constitutional interpretation. He took a "literal" or absolutist reading of the provisions of the Bill of Rights[4]: 115''118 and believed that the text of the Constitution is absolutely determinative on any question calling for judicial interpretation, leading to his reputation as a "textualist" and as a "strict constructionist". While the text of the constitution was an absolute limitation on the authority of judges in constitutional matters, within the confines of the text judges had a broad and unqualified mandate to enforce constitutional provisions, regardless of current public sentiment, or the feelings of the justices themselves.[4][page needed ]Thus, Black refused to join in the efforts of the justices on the Court who sought to abolish capital punishment in the United States, whose efforts succeeded (temporarily) in the term immediately following Black's death. He claimed that the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment's reference to takings of "life", and to "capital" crimes, meant approval of the death penalty was implicit in the Bill of Rights. He also was not persuaded that a right of privacy was implicit in the Ninth or Fourteenth amendments, and dissented from the Court's 1965 Griswold decision which invalidated a conviction for the use of contraceptives. Black said "It belittles that [Fourth] Amendment to talk about it as though it protects nothing but 'privacy' ... 'privacy' is a broad, abstract, and ambiguous concept ... The constitutional right of privacy is not found in the Constitution."[4]: 241
        Justice Black rejected reliance on what he called the "mysterious and uncertain" concept of natural law. According to Black that theory was vague and arbitrary, and merely allowed judges to impose their personal views on the nation. Instead, he argued that courts should limit themselves to a strict analysis of the actual text of the Constitution. Black was, in addition, an opponent of the "living constitution" theory. In his dissent to Griswold (1965), he wrote:
        I realize that many good and able men have eloquently spoken and written, sometimes in rhapsodical strains, about the duty of this Court to keep the Constitution in tune with the times. The idea is that the Constitution must be changed from time to time, and that this Court is charged with a duty to make those changes. For myself, I must, with all deference, reject that philosophy. The Constitution makers knew the need for change, and provided for it. Amendments suggested by the people's elected representatives can be submitted to the people or their selected agents for ratification. That method of change was good for our Fathers, and, being somewhat old-fashioned, I must add it is good enough for me.[47]
        Thus, some have seen Black as an originalist. David Strauss, for example, hails him as "[t]he most influential originalist judge of the last hundred years."[48] Black insisted that judges rely on the intent of the Framers as well as the "plain meaning" of the Constitution's words and phrases (drawing on the history of the period) when deciding a case.[citation needed ]
        Black additionally called for judicial restraint not usually seen in Court decision-making. The justices of the Court would validate the supremacy of the legislature in public policy-making, unless the legislature was denying people constitutional freedoms. Black stated that the legislature "was fully clothed with the power to govern and to maintain order."[4]: 112
        Federalism [ edit ] Black held an expansive view of legislative power, whether that be state or federal, and would often vote against judicial review of state laws that could be struck down under the Commerce Clause.[49] Previously, during the 1920s and 1930s, the Court had interpreted the commerce clause narrowly, often striking down laws on the grounds that Congress had overstepped its authority.[4]: 88''90 After 1937, however, the Supreme Court overturned several precedents and affirmed a broader interpretation of the commerce clause. Black consistently voted with the majority in these decisions; for example, he joined Mulford v. Smith, 307 U.S. 38 (1939), United States v. Darby Lumber Co., 312 U.S. 100 (1941), Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 (1942), Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States, 379 U.S. 241 (1964), and Katzenbach v. McClung, 379 U.S. 294 (1964).[citation needed ]
        In several other federalism cases, however, Black ruled against the federal government. For instance, he partially dissented from South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U.S. 301 (1966), in which the Court upheld the validity of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. In an attempt to protect the voting rights of African Americans, the act required any state whose population was at least 5% African American to obtain federal approval before changing its voting laws. Black wrote that the law,
        ... by providing that some of the States cannot pass state laws or adopt state constitutional amendments without first being compelled to beg federal authorities to approve their policies, so distorts our constitutional structure of government as to render any distinction drawn in the Constitution between state and federal power almost meaningless.[50]
        Similarly, in Oregon v. Mitchell (1970), he delivered the opinion of the court holding that the federal government was not entitled to set the voting age for state elections.[citation needed ]
        In the law of federal jurisdiction, Black made a large contribution by authoring the majority opinion in Younger v. Harris. This case, decided during Black's last year on the Court, has given rise to what is now known as Younger abstention. According to this doctrine, an important principle of federalism called "comity"'--that is, respect by federal courts for state courts'--dictates that federal courts abstain from intervening in ongoing state proceedings, absent the most compelling circumstances. The case is also famous for its discussion of what Black calls "Our Federalism," a discussion in which Black expatiates on
        proper respect for state functions, a recognition of the fact that the entire country is made up of a Union of separate state governments, and a continuance of the belief that the National Government will fare best if the States and their institutions are left free to perform their separate functions in their separate ways.[51]
        Black was an early supporter of the "one man, one vote" standard for apportionment set by Baker v. Carr. He had previously dissented in support of this view in Baker's predecessor case, Colegrove v. Green.[citation needed ]
        Civil rights [ edit ] As a senator, Black filibustered an anti-lynching bill.[52] However, during his tenure on the bench, Black established a record more sympathetic to the civil rights movement. He joined the majority in Shelley v. Kraemer (1948), which invalidated the judicial enforcement of racially restrictive covenants. Similarly, he was part of the unanimous Brown v. Board of Education (1954) Court that struck down racial segregation in public schools. Black remained determined to desegregate the South and would call for the Supreme Court to adopt a position of "immediate desegregation" in 1969's Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education.[citation needed ]
        Black authored the court's majority opinion in Korematsu v. United States, which validated Roosevelt's decision to intern Japanese Americans on the West Coast during World War II. The decision is an example of Black's belief in the limited role of the judiciary; he validated the legislative and executive actions that led to internment, saying "it is unnecessary for us to appraise the possible reasons which might have prompted the order to be used in the form it was."[4]: 113
        Black also tended to favor law and order over civil rights activism.[53][4]: 115 This led him to read the Civil Rights Act narrowly. For example, he dissented in multiple cases reversing convictions of sit-in protesters, arguing to limit the scope of the Civil Rights Act.[54] In 1968 he said, "Unfortunately there are some who think that Negroes should have special privileges under the law."[55] Black felt that actions like protesting, singing, or marching for "good causes" one day could lead to supporting evil causes later on; his sister-in-law explained that Black was "mortally afraid" of protesters. Black opposed the actions of some civil rights and Vietnam War protesters and believed that legislatures first, and courts second, should be responsible for alleviating social wrongs. Black once said he was "vigorously opposed to efforts to extend the First Amendment's freedom of speech beyond speech," to conduct.[4][page needed ]
        First Amendment [ edit ] Black took an absolutist approach to First Amendment jurisprudence, believing the first words of the Amendment that said "Congress shall make no law ..." Black rejected the creation of judicial tests for free speech standards, such as the tests for "clear and present danger", "bad tendency", "gravity of the evil," "reasonableness," or "balancing." Black would write that the First Amendment is "wholly 'beyond the reach' of federal power to abridge ... I do not believe that any federal agencies, including Congress and the Court, have power or authority to subordinate speech and press to what they think are 'more important interests.'"[4][page needed ]
        He believed that the First Amendment erected a metaphorical wall of separation between church and state. During his career Black wrote several important opinions relating to church-state separation. He delivered the opinion of the court in Everson v. Board of Education (1947), which held that the establishment clause was applicable not only to the federal government, but also to the states.[citation needed ]
        In four bar applicant appeals to the Supreme Court, Black advanced the argument that a person's political affiliation or beliefs, without action, was not enough to establish evidence of bad moral character. Black argued in 1957, in Schware v. Board of Bar Examiners (1957), that New Mexico could not exclude a law graduate from becoming a lawyer because Schware might have, at one time, consorted with communist causes. Schware was, in fact, a decorated veteran who fought in World War II. Black reaffirmed this position in Konigsberg v. State Bar of California (1957) decided in the same year. A majority of the Court sided with Black. However, in 1961, in both Konigsberg v. State Bar of California II (1961), and In re Anastaplo (1961), the majority of justices, over Black's vigorous dissent, determined that a person who refused to answer whether they had been a member of an organization on the Attorney General's Subversive Organizations List, could be excluded on the basis of bad character.[56]
        Black's majority opinion in McCollum v. Board of Education (1948) held that the government could not provide religious instruction in public schools. In Torcaso v. Watkins (1961), he delivered an opinion which affirmed that the states could not use religious tests as qualifications for public office. Similarly, he authored the majority opinion in Engel v. Vitale (1962), which declared it unconstitutional for states to require the recitation of official prayers in public schools.[citation needed ]
        Justice Black is often regarded as a leading defender of First Amendment rights such as the freedom of speech and of the press.[57] He refused to accept the doctrine that the freedom of speech could be curtailed on national security grounds. Thus, in New York Times Co. v. United States (1971), he voted to allow newspapers to publish the Pentagon Papers despite the Nixon Administration's contention that publication would have security implications. In his concurring opinion, Black stated,
        In the First Amendment the Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to fulfill its essential role in our democracy. The press was to serve the governed, not the governors. The Government's power to censor the press was abolished so that the press would remain forever free to censure the Government. The press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. ... The word 'security' is a broad, vague generality whose contours should not be invoked to abrogate the fundamental law embodied in the First Amendment.
        '--'‰
        New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713, 717 (1971).[58]He rejected the idea that the government was entitled to punish "obscene" speech. Likewise, he argued that defamation laws abridged the freedom of speech and were therefore unconstitutional. Most members of the Supreme Court rejected both of these views; Black's interpretation did attract the support of Justice Douglas.[4][page needed ]
        However, he did not believe that individuals had the right to speak wherever they pleased. He delivered the majority opinion in Adderley v. Florida (1966), controversially upholding a trespassing conviction for protesters who demonstrated on government property. He also dissented from Tinker v. Des Moines (1969), in which the Supreme Court ruled that students had the right to wear armbands (as a form of protest) in schools, writing,
        While I have always believed that under the First and Fourteenth Amendments neither the State nor the Federal Government has any authority to regulate or censor the content of speech, I have never believed that any person has a right to give speeches or engage in demonstrations where he pleases and when he pleases.[59]
        Moreover, Black took a narrow view of what constituted "speech" under the First Amendment; for him, "conduct" did not deserve the same protections that "speech" did.[4]: 114''115 For example, he did not believe that flag burning was speech; in Street v. New York (1969), he wrote: "It passes my belief that anything in the Federal Constitution bars a State from making the deliberate burning of the American flag an offense."[60] Similarly, he dissented from Cohen v. California (1971), in which the Court held that wearing a jacket emblazoned with the words "Fuck the Draft" was speech protected by the First Amendment. He asserted that this activity "was mainly conduct, and little speech."[citation needed ]
        As a Justice, Black held the view that the Court should literally enforce constitutional guarantees, especially the First Amendment free speech clause. He was often labeled an 'activist' because of his willingness to review legislation that arguably violated constitutional provisions. Black maintained that literalism was necessary to cabin judicial power.[61]
        For these reasons, he was one of the dissenting votes in the case of George Anastaplo who was prohibited from the Illinois Bar because he refused to denounce communists and refused to give a testimony of his political ideology. Black is quoted as stating:
        Anastaplo has not indicated, even remotely, a belief that this country is an oppressive one in which the 'right of revolution' should be exercised. Quite the contrary, the entire course of his life, as disclosed by the record, has been one of devotion and service to his country'--first, in his willingness to defend its security at the risk of his own life in time of war and, later, in his willingness to defend its freedoms at the risk of his professional career in time of peace.[62]
        In a 1968 public interview, reflecting on his most important contributions, Black put his dissent from Adamson v. California "at the top of the list, but then spoke with great eloquence from one of his earliest opinions in Chambers v. Florida (1940)."[61]
        Criminal procedure [ edit ] Black adopted a narrower interpretation of the Fourth Amendment than many of his colleagues on the Warren Court. He dissented from Katz v. United States (1967), in which the Court held that warrantless wiretapping violated the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unreasonable search and seizure. He argued that the Fourth Amendment only protected tangible items from physical searches or seizures. Thus, he concluded that telephone conversations were not within the scope of the amendment, and that warrantless wiretapping was consequently permissible.[citation needed ]
        Justice Black originally believed that the Constitution did not require the exclusion of illegally seized evidence at trials. In his concurrence to Wolf v. Colorado (1949), he claimed that the exclusionary rule was "not a command of the Fourth Amendment but ... a judicially created rule of evidence."[63] But he later changed his mind and joined the majority in Mapp v. Ohio (1961), which applied it to state as well as federal criminal investigations. In his concurrence, he indicated that his support was based on the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of the right against self-incrimination, not on the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures. He wrote, "I am still not persuaded that the Fourth Amendment, standing alone, would be enough to bar the introduction into evidence ... seized ... in violation of its commands."[64]
        In other instances Black took a fairly broad view of the rights of criminal defendants. He joined the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Miranda v. Arizona (1966), which required law enforcement officers to warn suspects of their rights prior to interrogations, and consistently voted to apply the guarantees of the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments at the state level.[citation needed ]
        Black was the author of the landmark decision in Gideon v. Wainwright (1963), which ruled that the states must provide an attorney to an indigent criminal defendant who cannot afford one. Before Gideon, the Court had held that such a requirement applied only to the federal government.[citation needed ]
        Bill of Rights applicable to states, or "incorporation" question [ edit ] One of the most notable aspects of Justice Black's jurisprudence was the view that the entirety of the federal Bill of Rights was applicable to the states. Originally, the Bill of Rights was binding only upon the federal government, as the Supreme Court ruled in Barron v. Baltimore (1833). According to Black, the Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, "incorporated" the Bill of Rights, or made it binding upon the states as well. In particular, he pointed to the Privileges or Immunities Clause, "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States." He proposed that the term "privileges or immunities" encompassed the rights mentioned in the first eight amendments to the Constitution.[4]: 212''213
        Black first expounded this theory of incorporation when the Supreme Court ruled in Adamson v. California (1947) that the Fifth Amendment's guarantee against self-incrimination did not apply to the states. It was during this period of time that Hugo Black became a disciple of John Lilburne and his claim of 'freeborn rights'.[65] In an appendix to his dissenting opinion, Justice Black analyzed statements made by those who framed the Fourteenth Amendment, reaching the conclusion that "the Fourteenth Amendment, and particularly its privileges and immunities clause, was a plain application of the Bill of Rights to the states."[66]
        Black's theory attracted the support of Justices such as Frank Murphy and William O. Douglas. However, it never achieved the support of a majority of the Court.[4][page needed ] The most prominent opponents of Black's theory were Justices Felix Frankfurter and John Marshall Harlan II.[4][page needed ] Frankfurter and Harlan argued that the Fourteenth Amendment did not incorporate the Bill of Rights per se, but merely protected rights that are "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty," which was the standard Justice Cardozo had established earlier in Palko v. Connecticut.[citation needed ]
        The Supreme Court never accepted the argument that the Fourteenth Amendment incorporated the entirety of the Bill of Rights.[67] However, it did agree that some "fundamental" guarantees were made applicable to the states. For the most part, during the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s, only First Amendment rights (such as free exercise of religion and freedom of speech) were deemed sufficiently fundamental by the Supreme Court to be incorporated.[citation needed ]
        However, during the 1960s, the Court under Chief Justice Warren took the process much further, making almost all guarantees of the Bill of Rights binding upon the states.[68] Thus, although the Court failed to accept Black's theory of total incorporation, the end result of its jurisprudence is very close to what Black advocated. Today, the only parts of the first eight amendments that have not been extended to the states are the Third and Seventh Amendments, the grand jury clause of the Fifth Amendment, the Eighth Amendment's protection against excessive bail, and the guarantee of the Sixth Amendment, as interpreted, that criminal juries be composed of 12 members.[69]
        Due process clause [ edit ] Justice Black was well known for his rejection of the doctrine of substantive due process. Most Supreme Court Justices accepted the view that the due process clause encompassed not only procedural guarantees, but also "fundamental fairness" and fundamental rights. Thus, it was argued that due process included a "substantive" component in addition to its "procedural" component.[70]
        Black, however, believed that this interpretation of the due process clause was unjustifiably broad. In his dissent to Griswold, he charged that the doctrine of substantive due process "takes away from Congress and States the power to make laws based on their own judgment of fairness and wisdom, and transfers that power to this Court for ultimate determination."[47] Instead, Black advocated a much narrower interpretation of the clause. In his dissent to In re Winship, he analyzed the history of the term "due process of law", and concluded: "For me, the only correct meaning of that phrase is that our Government must proceed according to the 'law of the land''--that is, according to written constitutional and statutory provisions as interpreted by court decisions."[71]
        Black's view on due process drew from his reading of British history; to him, due process meant all persons were to be tried in accordance with the Bill of Rights' procedural guarantees and in accordance with constitutionally pursuant laws. Black advocated equal treatment by the government for all persons, regardless of wealth, age, or race. Black's view of due process was restrictive in the sense that it was premised on equal procedures; it did not extend to substantive due process. This was in accordance with Black's literalist views.[4]: 116''117 Black did not tie procedural due process exclusively to the Bill of Rights, but he did tie it exclusively to the Bill of Rights combined with other explicit provisions of the Constitution.[72]
        None of Black's colleagues shared his interpretation of the due process clause. His chief rival on the issue (and on many other issues) was Felix Frankfurter, who advocated a substantive view of due process based on "natural law"'--if a challenged action did not "shock the conscience" of the jurist, or violate British concepts of fairness, Frankfurter would find no violation of due process of law. John M. Harlan II largely agreed with Frankfurter, and was highly critical of Black's view, indicating his "continued bafflement at ... Black's insistence that due process ... does not embody a concept of fundamental fairness" in his Winship concurrence.[71]
        Voting rights [ edit ] No right is more precious in a free country than that of having a voice in the election of those who make the laws under which, as good citizens, we must live. Other rights, even the most basic, are illusory if the right to vote is undermined.
        Our Constitution leaves no room for classification of people in a way that unnecessarily abridges this right.
        --Justice Black - on the right to vote as the foundation of democracy in Wesberry v. Sanders (1964).[73]
        Black was one of the Supreme Court's foremost defenders of the "one man, one vote" principle.[74] He delivered the opinion of the court in Wesberry v. Sanders (1964), holding that the Constitution required congressional districts in any state to be approximately equal in population. He concluded that the Constitution's command "that Representatives be chosen 'by the People of the several States' means that as nearly as is practicable one man's vote in a congressional election is to be worth as much as another's."[75] Likewise, he voted in favor of Reynolds v. Sims (1964), which extended the same requirement to state legislative districts on the basis of the equal protection clause.[citation needed ]
        At the same time, Black did not believe that the equal protection clause made poll taxes unconstitutional. During his first term on the Court, he participated in a unanimous decision to uphold Georgia's poll tax in the case of Breedlove v. Suttles.[76] Then, twenty-nine years later, he dissented from the Court's ruling in Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections (1966), invalidating the use of the poll tax as a qualification to vote, in which Breedlove was overturned. He criticized the Court for exceeding its "limited power to interpret the original meaning of the Equal Protection Clause" and for "giving that clause a new meaning which it believes represents a better governmental policy."[77] He also dissented from Kramer v. Union Free School District No. 15 (1969), in which a majority struck down a statute that prohibited registered voters from participating in certain school district elections unless they owned or rented real property in their local school district, or were parents or guardians of children attending the public schools in the district.[78]
        Equal Protection Clause [ edit ] By the late 1940s, Black believed that the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause was a constitutional prohibition against any state governmental actions that discriminated on the basis of race in an invidious or capricious manner. Black saw only race and the characteristics of alienage as the "suspect" categories that were addressed and protected by equal protection. Black believed that the equal protection clause could not be introduced as a means to invalidate state action, unless that action involved racial discrimination, discrimination against aliens, or the one-man, one-vote principle. Black would maintain this view to his death, saying that race and alienage discrimination litigation merited strict scrutiny, as did violations of the one-man, one vote principle, whereas all other state-action litigation did not.[4]: 118 During his last full term on the Court, he participated in a unanimous decision, Graham v. Richardson, striking down statutes that restricted welfare benefits to legal aliens but not to U.S. citizens. The majority opinion stated, "Aliens as a class are a prime example of a 'discrete and insular minority' for whom such heightened judicial solicitude is appropriate.[79]
        Retirement and death [ edit ] The Hugo L. Black United States Courthouse in Birmingham, Alabama
        Justice Black admitted himself to the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, in August 1971, and subsequently retired from the Court on September 17.[80] He suffered a stroke two days later and died on September 25.[81]
        Services were held at the National Cathedral, and over 1,000 persons attended. Pursuant to Justice Black's wishes, the coffin was "simple and cheap" and was displayed at the service to show that the costs of burial are not reflective of the worth of the human whose remains were present.[82]
        His remains were interred at the Arlington National Cemetery.[83][84] He is one of fourteen Supreme Court justices buried at Arlington. The others are Harry Blackmun, William Brennan, Arthur Goldberg, Thurgood Marshall, Potter Stewart, William O. Douglas, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg,[85] Chief Justice William Howard Taft, Chief Justice Earl Warren, Chief Justice Warren Burger, and Chief Justice William Rehnquist.[86]
        President Richard Nixon first considered nominating Hershel Friday to fill the vacant seat, but changed his mind after the American Bar Association found Friday unqualified. Nixon then nominated Lewis Powell, who was confirmed by the Senate.[citation needed ]
        Ku Klux Klan and anti-Catholicism [ edit ] Shortly after Black's appointment to the Supreme Court, Ray Sprigle of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette wrote a series of articles, for which he won a Pulitzer Prize, revealing Black's involvement in the Klan[4]: 96 [87] and describing his resignation from the Klan as "the first move of his campaign for the Democratic nomination for United States Senator from Alabama." Sprigle wrote that "Black and the leaders of the Klan decided it was good political strategy for Black to make the senatorial race unimpeded by Klan membership but backed by the power of the Klan. That resignation [was] filed for the duration of the campaign but never revealed to the rank and file of the order and held secretly in the records of the Alabama Realm..."[87]
        Roosevelt denied knowledge of Black's KKK membership.[88][89]
        In a radio statement on October 1, 1937,[90] Black said in part, "I number among my friends many members of the colored race. Certainly, they are entitled to the full measure of protection accorded by our Constitution and our laws ..."[91] Black also said, "I did join the Klan. I later resigned. I never rejoined. ... Before becoming a Senator I dropped the Klan. I have had nothing to do with it since that time. I abandoned it. I completely discontinued any association with the organization. I have never resumed it and never expect to do so."[4]: 98 The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that "fifty million listeners heard the unprecedented speech."[citation needed ]
        Near the end of his life, Black said that joining the Klan was a mistake: "I would have joined any group if it helped get me votes."[4]: 16, 50
        Biographers in the 1990s examined Black's views of religious denominations. Ball found regarding the Klan that Black "sympathized with the group's economic, nativist, and anti-Catholic beliefs."[4]: 16 Newman said Black "disliked the Catholic Church as an institution" and gave numerous anti-Catholic speeches in his 1926 election campaign to Ku Klux Klan meetings across Alabama.[92] However, in 1937 The Harvard Crimson reported on Black's appointment of a Jewish law clerk, noting that he "earlier had appointed Miss Annie Butt, a Catholic, as a secretary, and the Supreme Court had designated Leon Smallwood, a Negro and a Catholic as his messenger."[93] In the 1940s,[94] Black became intrigued by the writings of Paul Blanshard.[95][96]
        Thurgood Marshall and Brown v. Board of Education [ edit ] Black was one of the nine justices of the Supreme Court who in 1954 ruled unanimously in Brown v. Board of Education that segregation in public schools is unconstitutional. The plaintiffs were represented by Thurgood Marshall. A decade later, on October 2, 1967, Marshall became the first African American to be appointed to the Supreme Court, and served with Black on the Court until Black's retirement on September 17, 1971.
        United States v. Price [ edit ] In United States v. Price (1965), eighteen Ku Klux Klan members were charged with murder and conspiracy for the deaths of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, but the charges were dismissed by the trial court. A unanimous Supreme Court, which included Black, reversed the dismissal and ordered the case to proceed to trial. Seven of these men, including fellow Klansmen Samuel Bowers, Cecil Price and Alton Wayne Roberts were found guilty of the crime; eight of them, including Lawrence A. Rainey, were found not guilty; and three of them, including Edgar Ray Killen, had their cases end in a mistrial.[citation needed ]
        Legacy [ edit ] Hugo Black was twice the subject of covers of Time Magazine: On August 26, 1935 as a United States Senator;[97] and on October 9, 1964 as an Associate Justice (art by Robert Vickrey).[98]
        In 1986, Black appeared on the Great Americans series postage stamp issued by the United States Postal Service. Along with Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. he was one of only two Associate Justices to do so until the later inclusions of Thurgood Marshall, Joseph Story, Louis Brandeis, Felix Frankfurter, and William J. Brennan, Jr.[99][100] See, Justice Hugo L. Black 5 stamp. and Hugo L. Black, First Day Cover. In 1987, Congress passed a law sponsored by Ben Erdreich, H.R. 614, designating the new courthouse building for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama in Birmingham, as the "Hugo L. Black United States Courthouse."[citation needed ]
        An extensive collection of Black's personal, senatorial, and judicial papers is archived at the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress, where it is open for research.[101]
        Justice Black is honored in an exhibit in the Bounds Law Library at the University of Alabama School of Law. A special Hugo Black collection is maintained by the library.[102]
        Black served on the Supreme Court for thirty-four years, making him the fifth longest-serving Justice in Supreme Court history. He was the senior (longest serving) justice on the court for an unprecedented twenty-five years, from the death of Chief Justice Stone on April 22, 1946 to his own retirement on September 17, 1971. As the longest-serving associate justice, he was acting Chief Justice on two occasions: from Stone's death until Vinson took office on June 24, 1946; and from Vinson's death on September 8, 1953 until Warren took office on October 5, 1953. There was no interregnum between the Warren and Burger courts in 1969.[citation needed ]
        See also [ edit ] Hugo Black HouseList of justices of the Supreme Court of the United StatesList of law clerks of the Supreme Court of the United StatesList of United States Supreme Court justices by time in officeUnited States Supreme Court cases during the Burger CourtUnited States Supreme Court cases during the Hughes CourtUnited States Supreme Court cases during the Stone CourtUnited States Supreme Court cases during the Vinson CourtUnited States Supreme Court cases during the Warren CourtReferences [ edit ] ^ "Federal Judicial Center: Hugo Black". December 12, 2009. Archived from the original on May 13, 2009 . Retrieved December 12, 2009 . ^ a b c d Suitts, Steve. "Hugo L. Black". Encyclopedia of Alabama . Retrieved September 25, 2020 . ^ Newman, Hugo Black, pp. 195, 209, 228. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj ak al am an ao ap aq ar as at au av aw Ball, Howard. Hugo L. Black: Cold Steel Warrior. Oxford University Press. 2006. ISBN 0-19-507814-4 ^ Henry J. Abraham, Justices and Presidents: A Political History of Appointments to the Supreme Court (1992). ^ "List of Justices on the U.S. Supreme Court". Archived from the original on October 12, 2013 . Retrieved April 29, 2008 . ^ "Hugo Black". Archived from the original on January 11, 2012. History.com archived article ^ "The Digs: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Photo". pgdigs.tumblr.com . Retrieved July 7, 2017 . ^ "I Quit Klan: Black's Defense". Chicago Tribune. October 2, 1937 . Retrieved July 7, 2017 . ^ "Black, Hugo Lafayette". Federal Judicial Center . Retrieved September 3, 2020 . ^ Leonhart, James Chancellor (1962). The Fabulous Octogenarian. Baltimore Maryland: Redwood House, Inc. p. 139. ^ Armbrester, Margaret E. (1992). The Civitan Story. Birmingham, AL: Ebsco Media. p. 56. ^ a b c Van Der Veer, Virginia (April 1968). "Hugo Black and the K.K.K." American Heritage. 19 (3). ^ Yoder Jr., Edwin M. (March 16, 1986). "Justice Black At Home". The Washington Post . Retrieved September 25, 2020 . Book review of Mr. Justice and Mrs. Black; The Memoirs of Hugo L. Black and Elizabeth Black. ^ "Carr, Adam. "Direct Elections to the United States Senate 1914''98". ^ "U.S. Senate: Lobbyists". www.senate.gov. ^ "Black Describes Lobby Inquiry Tells Radio Audience "You Will Pay Bill" in Increased Utility Rates". Chronicling America Library of Congress . Retrieved August 11, 2019 . ^ a b c "U.S. Department of Labor '' History '' Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938". Dol.gov . Retrieved March 21, 2019 . ^ "Foes Seek to Block Mob Law". The Evening Independent. St. Petersburg, Florida. November 15, 1937. p. 22 . Retrieved March 22, 2014 . ^ Baker, Bruce E. (2007). What Reconstruction Meant: Historical Memory in the American South. University of Virginia Press. p. 99. ISBN 978-0813926605 . Retrieved March 22, 2014 . ^ "Pittsburgh Post-Gazette". news.google.com '' via Google News Archive Search. ^ "Senate Quickly Confirms Reed Nomination". The New York Times. January 26, 1938 . Retrieved April 23, 2020 . ^ Ariens, Michael. "Sherman Minton biography". Archived from the original on July 14, 2010 . Retrieved April 26, 2010 . ^ Leuchtenburg, William E. (Fall 1973). "A Klansman Joins the Court: The Appointment of Hugo L. Black". University of Chicago Law Review. 41 (1). doi:10.2307/1599085. JSTOR 1599085. ^ Hamm, Andrew (October 9, 2018). "A look back at Justice Hugo Black's first day on the bench". SCOTUSblog. ^ G. Edward White, The Constitution and the New Deal (2002) ^ Roger K. Newman, Hugo Black pp. 333''334. ^ Rehnquist, William H. (1987). The Supreme Court . New York: Knopf. ISBN 0-688-05714-4. ^ a b Salt of the Earth, Conscience of the Court. By John M. Ferren, Wiley Rutledge. p. 325. UNC Press. ^ Robert A. Caro, The Years of Lyndon Johnson: Means of Ascent pp. 379''384. ^ Caro, Robert A. (1990). The Years of Lyndon Johnson: Means of Ascent. New York: Vintage Books. ISBN 978-0-679-73371-3. ^ Laura Kalman (1990). Abe Fortas. Yale University Press. ISBN 0300173695 . Retrieved October 20, 2008 . ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ "Engel v. Vitale". Tourolaw.edu. Archived from the original on September 5, 2008 . Retrieved September 6, 2008 . ^ Lucas A. Powe, The Warren Court and American Politics (2000) ^ July 13, Tony Mauro; Journal, 2020 at 02:56 PM | The original version of this story was published on The National Law. "When Supreme Court Clerkships Become a Family Tradition". National Law Journal. ^ [1] ^ Schwartz, Bernard (1996), The Warren Court: A Retrospective, Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford Press, p. 195, ISBN 0-19-510439-0 ^ Cray, Ed (1997), Chief Justice: A Biography of Earl Warren, New York: Simon and Schuster, pp. 316''317, ISBN 0-684-80852-8 ^ Tushnet, Mark V. (1993), The Warren Court in historical and political perspective, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, p. 105, ISBN 0-8139-1459-0 ^ Tushnet 1993, p. 86. ^ Rosen, Jeffrey (January 9, 2007), The Supreme Court: The Personalities and Rivalries that Defined America, New York: Times Books, p. 219, ISBN 978-0-8050-8182-4 ^ Magee, James (1980), Mr. Justice Black: Absolutist on the Court , Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, ISBN 0-8139-0784-5 ^ Bork, Robert, (1990), The Tempting of America, p. 72, Simon & Schuster, New York ^ Magee, James J., (1980), Mr. Justice Black; Absolutism on the Supreme Court, p. 194, Charlottesville; University Press of Virginia ^ U.S. News & World Report, volume 63 (1967), p. 38 ^ a b "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ Strauss, "The Death of Judicial Conservatism," 4 Duke J. Const. L. & Pub. Pol'y 1, 4 (2009). ^ ..Mr. Justice Black and His Critics... By Tinsley E. Yarbrough. p. 44. Duke University Press ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ Schlesinger, Arthur, Jr., The Age of Roosevelt Vol. III 437 (Houghton Mifflin 1988). ISBN 0-618-34087-4. ^ Schwartz, Bernard, Super Chief (1983) p. 630 ^ Hamm v. Rock Hill, 379 U.S. 306, 318 (1964) (Black, J., dissenting). See also Bell v. Maryland, 378 U.S. 226, 318 (1964) (Black, J., dissenting); Adderley v. Fla., 385 U.S. 39 (1966) (Black, J.); Brown v. Louisiana. ^ Newman,Hugo Black p. 550. ^ Joshua E. Kastenberg, Hugo Black's Vision of the Lawyer, the First Amendment, and the Duty of the Judiciary: The Bar Applicant Cases in a National Security State, 20 William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal, 661 (2012) ^ Loren P. Beth, "Mr. Justice Black and the First Amendment: Comments on the Dilemma of Constitutional Interpretation," Journal of Politics, Nov 1979, Vol. 41 Issue 4, pp. 1105''1124 ^ New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713, 714 (1971). (Black, J., concurring). ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ a b Hugo L. Black, Official Supreme Court media at Oyez.org. ^ "In re George Anastaplo, Petitioner". Open Jurist. ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ John Lilburne. The Pedigree of America's Constitution: An Alternative Explanation. Gilder, Eric and Hagger, Mervyn. British and American Studies (University of the West, TimiÈoara) 14 (2008): 217''226."Archived copy". Archived from the original on August 28, 2010 . Retrieved August 24, 2010 . CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Retrieved 2010-06-24 ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ "The Fourteenth Amendment and the Incorporation Debate". Law.umkc.edu. Archived from the original on October 19, 2008 . Retrieved September 6, 2008 . ^ "The Supreme Court Under Earl Warren, 1953''1969". Bsos.umd.edu. Archived from the original on August 12, 2009 . Retrieved September 6, 2008 . ^ "BRI". Billofrightsinstitute.org. Archived from the original on August 3, 2008 . Retrieved September 6, 2008 . ^ "Due Process of Law '' Substantive Due Process, Procedural Due Process, Further Readings". Law.jrank.org . Retrieved September 6, 2008 . ^ a b "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ Wiecek, William (2006). The birth of the modern Constitution: the United States Supreme Court, 1941''1953. p. 517. ISBN 978-0521848206. ^ "Wesberry v. Sanders, 376 U.S. 1 (1964), at 17-18". Justia US Supreme Court Center. February 17, 1964 . Retrieved January 5, 2021 . ^ Hugo Black. By Roger K. Newman. Fordham University Press. p. 575. ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ "Breedlove v. Suttles, 302 U.S. 277 (1937)". ^ "FindLaw's United States Supreme Court case and opinions". Findlaw. ^ "Kramer v. Union Free Sch. Dist. No. 15, 395 U.S. 621 (1969)". ^ "Graham v. Richardson 403 U.S. 365 (1971)". ^ Black had signed an undated letter of resignation on August 26, the day before his August 27 admission to Bethesda. The letter was delivered to President Nixon by Black's messenger on September 17; Bob Woodward; Scott Armstrong (1981). The Brethren: inside the Supreme Court. Avon Books. pp. 183''184. ISBN 978-0-380-52183-8. ^ "Hugo Black Suffers Stroke; Condition Listed as Serious". The New York Times. September 23, 1971 . Retrieved October 2, 2020 . ^ Pesaresi, Josephine Black "Simple and Cheap" My Father Said, Monday, 26 November 2007 Archived 2 April 2010 at the Wayback Machine Funeral Consumers Alliance. ^ Christensen, George A. (1983), "Here Lies the Supreme Court: Gravesites of the Justices". Archived from the original on September 3, 2005 . Retrieved November 24, 2013 . , Yearbook, Supreme Court Historical Society. ^ Christensen, George A. (2008), "Here Lies the Supreme Court: Revisited", Journal of Supreme Court History, 33 (1): 17''41, doi:10.1111/j.1540-5818.2008.00177.x ^ "The late Ruth Bader Ginsburg buried at Arlington Cemetery Tuesday" . Retrieved October 15, 2020 . ^ "Notable Graves: Supreme Court". Arlington National Cemetery . Retrieved December 2, 2020 . ^ a b "The Digs: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette : Photo". pgdigs.tumblr.com . Retrieved November 8, 2016 . ^ "FDR Press Conference #398" (PDF) . September 14, 1937 . Retrieved November 8, 2016 '' via FDR Presidential Library & Museum. ^ Roger Daniels (2015). Franklin D. Roosevelt: Road to the New Deal, 1882''1939. University of Illinois Press. p. 381. ISBN 978-0-252-09762-1. ^ "Justice Hugo Black admits his membership in Ku Klux Klan in an address to the nation through radio in Washington D.C." (video) . www.criticalpast.com . Retrieved November 8, 2016 . ^ "The Supreme Court . Transcript | PBS". www.pbs.org . Retrieved November 8, 2016 . ^ Roger K. Newman, Hugo Black: a biography (1997) pp. 87, 104 ^ See "Harvard Jew Appointed by Hugo Black To Be Law Clerk," The Harvard Crimson(October 5, 1937). Retrieved 22 March 2014. ^ Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation Between Church and State ^ The Political Theology of Justice Hugo Black ^ No Establishment of Religion '' America's Original Contribution to Religious Liberty ^ "Time Magazine cover, Hugo L. Black, United States Senator". Time Magazine. August 26, 1935 . Retrieved August 27, 2011 . ^ "Time Magazine cover, Hugo L. Black, United States Justice". Time Magazine. October 9, 1964 . Retrieved August 27, 2011 . ^ "Supreme Court Justices Honored on Stamp Souvenir Sheet". Archived from the original on February 24, 2011. ^ "United States Postal Service. Philatelic News.". Archived from the original on February 7, 2010. ^ "Library of Congress manuscripts catalog, Hugo Black papers". Archived from the original on May 3, 2008. ^ "Bounds Law Library, Hugo Black special collection". Archived from the original on July 23, 2008. Further reading [ edit ] Abraham, Henry J., Justices and Presidents: A Political History of Appointments to the Supreme Court. 3d. ed. (Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1992). ISBN 0-19-506557-3.Atkins, Burton M.; Sloope, Terry (1986). "The 'New' Hugo Black and the Warren Court". Polity. 18 (4): 621''637. doi:10.2307/3234885. JSTOR 3234885. S2CID 155514353. Argues that in the 1960s Black moved to the right on cases involving civil liberties, civil rights, and economic liberalism.Ball, Howard; Cooper, Phillip (1994). "Fighting Justices: Hugo L. Black and William O. Douglas and Supreme Court Conflict". American Journal of Legal History. 38 (1): 1''37. doi:10.2307/845321. JSTOR 845321. Ball, Howard. (1992). Of Power and Right : Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, and America's Constitutional Revolution. Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-504612-0.Ball, Howard. (1996). Hugo L. Black: Cold Steel Warrior. Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-507814-4.Ball, Howard and Phillip J. Cooper. (1992) . Of Power and Right: Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, and America's Constitutional Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press.Ball, Howard. (1975). The Vision and the Dream of Justice Hugo L. Black: An Examination of a Judicial Philosophy. University, AL: University of Alabama Press.Belknap, Michael, The Supreme Court Under Earl Warren, 1953''1969 (2005), 406 pp. excerpt and text searchCushman, Clare, The Supreme Court Justices: Illustrated Biographies,1789''1995 (2nd ed.) (Supreme Court Historical Society), (Congressional Quarterly Books, 2001) ISBN 978-1-56802-126-3.Dunne, Gerald T. (1977). Hugo Black and the Judicial Revolution. New York: Simon & Schuster.Frank, John Paul. (1949). Mr. Justice Black, the Man and His Opinions. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.Frank, John Paul, The Justices of the United States Supreme Court: Their Lives and Major Opinions (Leon Friedman and Fred L. Israel, editors) (Chelsea House Publishers: 1995) ISBN 978-0-7910-1377-9.Freyer, Tony Allen. (1990). Hugo L. Black and the Dilemma of American Liberalism. Glenview, IL: Scott, Foresman. ISBN 978-0-8173-1194-0.Freyer, Tony Allan, ed. (1990). Justice Hugo Black and Modern America. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press. ISBN 0-8173-1194-7.Hall, Kermit L., ed. The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States. Oxford Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1992. ISBN 0-19-505835-6Hamilton, Virginia Van der Veer. (1972). Hugo Black: The Alabama Years. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Hockett, Jeffrey D. (1992). "Justices Frankfurter and Black: Social Theory and Constitutional Interpretation". Political Science Quarterly. 107 (3): 479''499. doi:10.2307/2152441. JSTOR 2152441. Hockett, Jeffrey D. (1996). New Deal Justice: The Constitutional Jurisprudence of Hugo L. Black, Felix Frankfurther, and Robert H. Jackson. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. ISBN 978-0-8476-8210-2.Magee, James J. (1980). Mr. Justice Black, Absolutist of the Court. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. ISBN 1-58838-144-7.Mendelson, Wallace. (1961). Justices Black and Frankfurter: Conflict in the Court. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Newman, Roger K. (1994). Hugo Black: A Biography. New York: Pantheon Books. ISBN 978-0-8232-1786-1, 0-679-43180-2.Pritchett, C. Herman, Civil Liberties and the Vinson Court. (The University of Chicago Press, 1969) ISBN 978-0-226-68443-7Silverstein, Mark. (1984). Constitutional Faiths: Felix Frankfurter, Hugo Black, and the Process of Judicial Decision Making. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Simon, James F. (1989). The Antagonists: Hugo Black, Felix Frankfurter, and Civil Liberties in America. New York: Simon & Schuster.Strickland, Stephen Parks, ed. (1967). Hugo Black and the Supreme Court: A Symposium. Indianapolis, Bobbs-Merrill.Suitts, Steve. (2005). Hugo Black of Alabama. Montgomery, AL: New South Books. ISBN 1-58838-144-7.Urofsky, Melvin I., Division and Discord: The Supreme Court under Stone and Vinson, 1941''1953 (University of South Carolina Press, 1997) ISBN 1-57003-120-7.Urofsky, Melvin I., The Supreme Court Justices: A Biographical Dictionary (New York: Garland Publishing 1994). 590 pp. ISBN 978-0-8153-1176-8.Williams, Charlotte. (1950). Hugo L. Black: A Study in the Judicial Process. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins Press.Woodward, Robert and Armstrong, Scott. The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court (1979). ISBN 978-0-380-52183-8, 978-0-671-24110-0, 978-0-7432-7402-9.Yarbrough, Tinsley E. (1971). "Mr. Justice Black and Legal Positivism". Virginia Law Review. 57 (3): 375''407. doi:10.2307/1072096. JSTOR 1072096. Yarbrough, Tinsley E. (1989). Mr. Justice Black and His Critics. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Primary sources [ edit ] Black, Hugo L. (1968). A Constitutional Faith. New York, Knopf.Black, Hugo L and Elizabeth Black. (1985). Mr. Justice Black and Mrs. Black: The Memoirs of Hugo L. Black and Elizabeth Black. New York: Random House. ISBN 978-0-394-54432-8.Black, Hugo L., Mr. Justice Murphy. 48 Michigan Law Review 739 (1950).Black, Hugo, Jr. (1975). My Father: A Remembrance. New York: Random House.External links [ edit ] United States Congress. "Hugo Black (id: B000499)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Hugo Lafayette Black at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.Ariens, Michael, Hugo BlackFox, John, Capitalism and Conflict, Biographies of the Robes, Hugo Black. Public Broadcasting Service.Goldman, Jeremy. "Hugo L. Black." Oyez Project.Suitts, Steve, Hugo Black, Encyclopedia of Alabama.Supreme Court Historical Society. "Hugo L. Black."Hugo Black of Alabama: How His Roots and Early Career Shaped the Great Champion of the Constitution. Library of Congress, John W. Kluge Center Video of Steve Suitts discussing his book "Hugo Black of Alabama"Pesaresi, Josephine Black. "'Simple and Cheap' My Father Said" '' preparations for her father's funeral.Reich, Charles A. (2010). "A Passion for Justice" (PDF) . Touro Law Review. 26: 393''431. ANC ExplorerFBI file on Hugo Black at vault.fbi.govNewspaper clippings about Hugo Black in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBWJohn Jay (1789''1795, cases)John Rutledge (1795, cases)Oliver Ellsworth (1796''1800, cases)John Marshall (1801''1835, cases)Roger B. Taney (1836''1864, cases)Salmon P. Chase (1864''1873, cases)Morrison Waite (1874''1888, cases)Melville Fuller (1888''1910, cases)Edward Douglass White (1910''1921, cases)William Howard Taft (1921''1930, cases)Charles Evans Hughes (1930''1941, cases)Harlan F. Stone (1941''1946, cases)Fred M. Vinson (1946''1953, cases)Earl Warren (1953''1969, cases)Warren E. Burger (1969''1986, cases)William Rehnquist (1986''2005, cases)John Roberts (2005''present, cases)
      Highlander Folk School | The Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute
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        Sun, 11 Jul 2021 02:00
        On 2 September 1957, Martin Luther King joined with the staff and the participants of a leadership training conference at Highlander Folk School to celebrate its 25th anniversary. In his closing address to the conference, King praised Highlander for its ''noble purpose and creative work,'' and contribution to the South of ''some of its most responsible leaders in this great period of transition'' (Papers 4:270).
        In 1932, Myles Horton, a former student of Reinhold Niebuhr, established the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee. The school, situated in the Tennessee hills, initially focused on labor and adult education. By the early 1950s, however, it shifted its attention to race relations. Highlander was one of the few places in the South where integrated meetings could take place, and served as a site of leadership training for southern civil rights activists. Rosa Parks attended a 1955 workshop at Highlander four months before refusing to give up her bus seat, an act that ignited the Montgomery bus boycott.
        Lead by Septima Clark, Esau Jenkins, and Bernice Robinson, Highlander developed a citizenship program in the mid-1950s that taught African Americans their rights as citizens while promoting basic literacy skills. Reflecting on his experiences with the Citizenship Schools and the emergence of new leaders from ''noncharismatic people'' who attended the training, Horton concluded that ''educational work during social movement periods provides the best opportunity for multiplying democratic leadership'' (Horton, Long Haul, 127).
        Horton, who claimed he had first met King during the civil right leader ' s junior year at Morehouse College, invited King to participate in Highlander's anniversary celebration in 1957. While attending the celebration, an undercover agent sent by the Georgia Commission on Education took a photograph of King. The photo was sent throughout the South and used as a propaganda tool against King, with claims that it showed him attending a Communist training school.
        Highlander continued to be a center for developing future leaders of the movement such as Marion Barry, Diane Nash, and James Bevel. It was closed in 1961 when the Tennessee government revoked its charter on falsified charges that the school was being run for profit and that it did not fulfill its nonprofit requirements. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) took over the citizenship program that year, feeling that it offered, according to King, a plus for SCLC and the movement ''in filling the need for developing new leadership as teachers and supervisors and providing the broad educational base for the population at large through the establishment of Citizenship Schools conducted by these new leaders throughout the South'' (King, January 1961). Under the leadership of SCLC and the supervision of Clark, Dorothy Cotton, and Andrew Young, the schools eventually trained approximately 100,000 adults. In August 1961, Horton opened another school in Knoxville, Tennessee, called the Highlander Research and Education Center. He and the Center participated in the 1968 Poor People's Campaign and, after King's assassination, erected a tent complex at Resurrection City in Washington, D.C., holding workshops until police closed the encampment in June 1968.
      Covid passports 'will be compulsory in pubs, clubs & restaurants' - LIVE | Evening Standard
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 22:34
        Covid certificates will be needed to enter pubs, bars, restaurants and clubs under plans to stave off a fourth wave of the virus in the autumn, it has been reported.
        The proposals would mean Britons would have to show vaccination passports to prove they are double-jabbed or have had a recent negative test before entering entertainment venues.
        Experts hope the move will increase the stalling vaccination rates among young people and limit another surge in cases.
        A Downing Street source told The Times: ''In autumn vaccine passports could become an important tool that will allow us to keep things open.''
        Another added: ''If we can show real benefits of getting vaccinated in terms of everyday life then it could be quite a useful tool.''
        The Government's certification review release earlier in the week said although the so-called vaccine passports would not be mandated now, it did not rule out the prospect if England faces ''a difficult situation in autumn or winter''.
        Live updates1625930002Police urge England fans without tickets to not travel to London on SundayPolice have urged England fans without tickets for the Euro 2020 final on Sunday not to travel to London as cases continue to rise in the capital and across the UK.
        The force also asked football fans not to congregate in large groups amid the spread the Delta variant.
        1625928872Bangladesh secures 17.5 million more vaccinesBangladesh's health minister said today that the country has secured an additional 17.5 million vaccine doses, amid record coronavirus deaths and over a million cases.
        The country, which has a population of 169m, has been under strict lockdown for two weeks with troops on the streets to stop people going outdoors.
        1625927575The Netherlands reports 10,345 new coronavirus cases The Netherlands has reported 10,345 new coronavirus cases - the most in one day since Christmas.
        According to the NL Times, the surge has brought the seven day average up by 41% to 4,504 and the daily average is now 7.5 times higher than it was 11 days ago.
        1625927522Up to a fifth of staff could be absent from one NHS trust in just three weeks from nowUp to a fifth of staff could be absent from one NHS trust in just three weeks from now, potentially leading to the cancellation of as many as 900 operations, a representative organisation has warned.
        NHS Providers, the membership organisation for NHS trusts in England, said a combination of staff having to self-isolate due to rising coronavirus infection levels and people ''rightly'' taking annual leave that was delayed due to the pandemic is likely to put a strain on the health service.
        NHS Providers chief executive Chris Hopson said: ''Covid-19 infection rates are rising rapidly, with the Secretary of State predicting 100,000 cases a day.
        ''This will mean the number of staff having to self-isolate will continue to rise if current procedures are kept in place.
        ''Trusts are also expecting a very stretched holiday and leave period this summer, with high numbers of staff rightly taking annual leave that was delayed due to Covid-19 pressures early this, and late, last year.
        ''One trust is predicting that its overall absence rates are potentially going to reach 20 per cent in three weeks' time, which means they would have to cancel up to 900 operations.''
        1625926257Scotland records seven deaths and 2,190 casesScotland has recorded seven deaths of coronavirus patients and 2,190 cases in the past 24 hours, the latest figures show.
        The Scottish Government's figures for Saturday also showed the daily test positivity rate was at 9%.
        A total of 435 people were in hospital with recently confirmed Covid-19, with 42 patients in intensive care.
        So far, 3,920,145 people in Scotland have received the first dose of a Covid-19 vaccination and 2,861,110 have received their second dose.
        1625919689Thailand registers highest daily death tollThailand has reported a record daily figure of 91 coronavirus deaths and 9,326 new cases.
        According to the Bangkok Post, the previous highest number of fatalities recorded in a day was 75 on Thursday, when the country also logged 7,058 new infections.
        The majority of the deaths were in the capital, which also recorded 3,191 of Saturday's cases.
        Getty Images 1625917227Malta to become first EU country to require proof of vaccination from travellersMalta has become the first European Union country to require proof of vaccination for visitors.
        From Wednesday, visitors aged 13 and over will have to show a Covid-19 vaccination certificate issued in either Malta, the EU or the UK.
        Health minister Chris Fearne said: ''Malta will be the first EU country taking this step.''
        Children aged 5-12 will instead have to show proof of a negative PCR test and younger children are exempt.
        Malta had 46 active cases on 1 July and 252 active cases yesterday. So far, 79 per cent of adults have been fully vaccinated.
        1625914193Olympics: Fukushima to ban spectators from eventsFukushima is to ban spectators from Olympic events because of rising coronavirus infections as Japan prepares to host the games in less than two weeks.
        It comes after organisers said on Thursday that although there would be no spectators in Tokyo after a state of emergency was declared in the capital, they would be permitted in Fukushima '' which is hosting seven softball and baseball games '' and other prefectures.
        Fukushima Azuma Baseball Stadium, which will host the baseball and softball competitions during the Tokyo 2020 Olympic
        / REUTERSBut the governor of Fukushima prefecture, Masao Uchibori, said today that they would not be permitted after all, Reuters reports.
        1625910501South Korea reports highest ever daily COVID-19 cases of 1,378South Korea had its highest-ever number of new daily COVID-19 infections of 1,378 in the last 24 hours, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency said on Saturday.
        Starting on Monday, coronavirus curbs will be tightened to the strictest level possible in Seoul and neighbouring regions for the first time, South Korea said on Friday, as a streak of record new COVID-19 cases fanned concern.
        1625908973EU delivers enough doses to vaccinate 70 per cent adults, von der Leyen saysThe European Union (EU) has delivered enough coronavirus vaccine doses to member states to vaccinate at least 70 per cent of adults, European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement.
        Von der Leyen urged the EU countries to increase vaccinations and said that about 500 million doses would be distributed across the union by Sunday.
        MORE ABOUT NHScovidDowning Streetself-isolationEnglandRestaurantsClubsPubsBars Have your say... Get involved in exciting, inspiring conversations. Get involved in exciting, inspiring conversations with other readers. VIEW COMMENTS
      TheRebelTheGOAT on Twitter: "President of Suriname (0.6 mil inhabitants ie 0.2 lessthan Amsterdam, 4 times size of Netherlands, from Native American POV still colonized ) clear: no covax pass, no admittance to society @adamcurry @GovRonDeSantis" / Twitter
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 22:20
        TheRebelTheGOAT : President of Suriname (0.6 mil inhabitants ie 0.2 lessthan Amsterdam, 4 times size of Netherlands, from Native Amer'... https://t.co/jHieJN5eS1
        Sat Jul 10 20:57:45 +0000 2021
      Darth Winston on Twitter: "@AlexBerenson @adamcurry @THErealDVORAK ðŸ‘‡ https://t.co/SQoljXJhA3" / Twitter
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 22:18
        Darth Winston : @AlexBerenson @adamcurry @THErealDVORAK ðŸ‘‡ https://t.co/SQoljXJhA3
        Sat Jul 10 22:04:01 +0000 2021
      Apple's Privacy Changes Are Poised to Boost Its Ad Products - WSJ
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 22:05
        Under Apple Inc.'s new privacy restrictions, advertisers targeting iPhone users will get more data about ad performance if they buy Apple's ad space than if they buy through third parties, according to ad-industry executives.
        The difference could eventually give Apple's small but growing ad business an edge over rivals, ad executives and app makers say.
        Apple's latest operating system for iPhones has set off a firestorm in the ad industry and beyond by letting users decide whether to let apps track them for advertising purposes'--changes that mean companies may soon have less data about who sees their ads. Apps on Apple's iOS platform must ask users' permission to track them for advertising purposes.
        When targeting users who have opted out of tracking, advertisers who buy ads through third-party platforms will have to wait three days for insights on their campaigns and will receive only aggregate information, such as the total number of users who took an action after an ad, people familiar with Apple's ad products said.
        Advertisers who buy Apple ad space can receive more data about user behavior, the people said. They can learn which version of their ads users saw and which search keywords ads appeared on, they said. Those advertisers will get results nearly in real time, the people said.
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        That could give Apple an edge in luring advertisers, especially if the tech company expands its ad business, ad-industry executives say. Right now, Apple sells search ads that appear in its App Store and display ads that appear in its News and Stocks apps.
        An Apple spokesman denied that the company is advantaging its own products and said the data restrictions for ads bought on third-party platforms are needed because some advertisers could use that information to circumvent Apple's privacy rules and track individual users. Apple's own ad products can't be exploited in the same way, the company said, because advertisers on its platforms can only target large groups of people.
        Apple's advertising business consists primarily of search ads on its app store, which won't be affected by the coming privacy restrictions. Those ad placements mostly appeal to a relatively small subset of advertisers: app makers, which can bid to appear atop search results.
        Apple's app-store advertising is expected to bring in about $2 billion this fiscal year, according to an estimate from Cowen & Co. Last fiscal year, Apple's total revenue was $274.52 billion. By comparison, Facebook Inc. reported $84.17 billion in ad revenue last year.
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        Apple is planning to expand its ad offerings and is testing a new ad slot that will be available in the App Store's ''suggested'' category, which could be targeted based on users' interest and audience data, the people familiar with Apple's ad products said. The Financial Times earlier reported on Apple's planned ad slot.
        Even without more ad space to sell, Apple could fetch higher ad prices if demand for its ad space rises as a result of the privacy changes, ad executives said.
        E, an analyst and marketing-strategy consultant, criticized Apple's plan, saying detailed data on ads' performance is valuable to marketers. ''So it's not really clear why they would withhold it from'' advertisers buying through other ad sellers, he said, ''unless they were just really trying to privilege their own ad networks.''
        Apple said the technologies behind its new privacy restrictions are ''designed to help developers implement safe advertising practices and protect users'--not to advantage Apple.''
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        Facebook, app publishers and ad-tech companies have also criticized the changes. In March, France's competition regulator rejected advertisers' push to halt Apple's software update. The regulator is reviewing whether Apple applied less stringent data-use rules to itself than to other services, and has promised a final ruling by early next year.
        Apple said it was looking forward to further engagement with France's competition regulator on the matter. ''We firmly believe that users' data belongs to them, and that they should control when that data is shared, and with whom,'' the company said.
        Herbert Hovenkamp, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, said critics will struggle to argue that Apple's privacy rules violate antitrust laws, since the company says it is motivated by privacy concerns and offers users a choice of whether or not to accept tracking.
        Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal, has a commercial agreement to supply news through Apple services.
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        Ad executives say Apple could become a big player in the $400 billion global digital-ad industry. The company has gone down that road before. It bid in 2009 on AdMob Inc., a specialist in brokering ad sales on mobile phones, but was beat out by Google. Apple in 2010 launched its own ad network, iAd, which facilitated ad sales in iPhone apps. The business failed to catch on, and Apple shut it in 2016.
        ''Apple basically almost recused themselves from the advertising ecosystem a number of years ago because it was too small, and they had a perception that it was going to damage the brand of their hardware business,'' said Chad Engelgau, chief executive officer of Acxiom, the data unit owned by ad-agency holding company Interpublic Group of Cos. ''They are absolutely investing in the advertising business going forward,'' he said. ''They have a level of control, being a hardware manufacturer, being a content provider.''
        In 2018 Apple sought to expand its digital-advertising business, and met with major apps including Snap Inc. and Pinterest Inc. about participating in an Apple network that would distribute ads across a network of participating apps.
        Competing with Google and Facebook on ads that appear in mobile-phone apps wouldn't be easy. Google and Facebook dominated, in part, because of their detailed data on users. Apple has criticized extensive use of data for advertising.
        Write to Patience Haggin at patience.haggin@wsj.com
      Two 'assassins' who 'helped murder Haitian president' both worked for Miami-based security firm | Daily Mail Online
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 22:02
        Two 'hitmen' suspected of helping to assassinate Haiti's president both worked for a Miami-based security firm that paid staff $2,700-a-month to 'provide protection for powerful individuals' on the island, it was claimed Saturday.
        Haiti National Police believe 28 people were involved in Wednesday's raid that killed President Jovenel Mo¯se, 53, with 17 arrested, three dead and eight still at large.
        The sister of one of the dead suspects, Duberney Capador, 40, said her brother, who retired from the Colombian army in 2019 with the rank of sergeant, was hired by a private security firm with the understanding he would be providing protection for powerful individuals in Haiti.
        She said she knew nothing about his employer, but shared a photo of her brother emblazoned in the logo of CTU Security - a company based in Doral, a Miami suburb popular with Colombian migrants.
        Two suspects accused of helping to assassinate Haiti's president worked for a Miami firm called CTU Security. Pictured is its president, Tony Intriago. He has not been linked to the plot
        CTU´s website lists two addresses, one of which is a gray-colored warehouse that was shuttered Friday with no sign indicating who it belonged to
        The other is a small suite under a different company´s name in a modern office building a few blocks away
        The wife of Francisco Uribe, who was among those arrested, told Colombia's W Radio that CTU offered to pay the men about $2,700 a month - a paltry sum for a dangerous international mission but far more than what most of the men, noncommissioned officers and professional soldiers, earned from their pensions.
        CTU Security was registered in 2008 and lists as its president Antonio Intriago, who is also affiliated with several other Florida-registered entities, some of them since dissolved, including the Counter Terrorist Unit Federal Academy, the Venezuelan American National Council and Doral Food Corp.
        CTU´s website lists two addresses, one of which is a gray-colored warehouse that was shuttered Friday with no sign indicating who it belonged to.
        The other is a small suite under a different company´s name in a modern office building a few blocks away.
        A receptionist at the office said Intriago stops by every few days to collect mail and hold meetings. Intriago, who is Venezuelan, did not return phone calls and an email seeking comment. He has not been linked to last week's events in Haiti.
        Duberney Capador's sister Yenny said she last spoke to her brother late Wednesday - hours after Mo¯se´s murder - when the men, holed up in a home and surrounded, were desperately trying to negotiate their way out of a shootout.
        American-Haitian James Solages, 35, (left) worked as a driver and bodyguard for a relief organization set up by Sean Penn (right, in Haiti) following the magnitude 7.0 quake that killed 300,000 Haitians and left tens of thousands homeless
        Solages (left) and Joseph Vincent (right) are seen at a Thursday press conference where Haitian authorities paraded the detained suspects. The two US citizens allegedly claimed they were hired as translators in a plot to arrest the Haitian president but not to kill him
        'He told me not to tell our mother, so she wouldn´t worry,' she said, fighting back tears.
        'We are the ones who are most interested in clarifying what happened, so that my brother´s reputation does not remain like it is,' said Capador. 'He was a humble, hard-working man. He had honors and decorations.'
        It´s not known who masterminded the attack. And numerous questions remain about how the perpetrators were able to penetrate the president´s residence posing as U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents, meeting little resistance from those charged with protecting the president.
        Uribe is under investigation in the alleged murder of an unarmed civilian in 2008 who was presented as someone killed in combat, one of thousands of extrajudicial killings that rocked Colombia´s U.S.-trained army more than a decade ago.
        Besides the Colombians, among those detained by police were two Haitian Americans, one of whom worked with Sean Penn after the star set up a charity to help rebuild the island after its devastating 2020 earthquake.
        James Solages, 35, worked as a driver and bodyguard for the relief organization set up to respond to the aftermath of the magnitude 7.0 quake that killed 300,000 Haitians and left tens of thousands homeless.
        It is not known if they ever worked directly together.
        Suspects in the assassination of Haiti's President Jovenel Moise are shown to the media in Port-au-Prince, Haiti on Thursday
        In an online profile Solages also lists as past employers the Canadian Embassy in Haiti, while his Facebook page - which was taken down following news of his arrest - features photos of armored military vehicles and a shot of himself standing in front of an American flag.
        Solages described himself as a 'certified diplomatic agent,' an advocate for children and budding politician on a now-removed website for a charity he started in 2019 in south Florida to assist resident of his home town of Jacmel, on Haiti´s southern coast.
        Solages and fellow Haitian-American Joseph Vincent, 55, are said to have confessed to being involved in Wednesday's early morning raid that left president Jovenel Mo¯se dead and his wife fighting for her life. However, they allegedly claimed they were hired as translators in a plot to arrest politician but not to kill him.
        Vincent allegedly claimed the plot was orchestrated by a foreigner named 'Mike' who spoke English and Spanish, they planned to take Mo¯se to the National Palace and the plot was devised over the course of a month in a hotel in P(C)tion-Ville.
        Jean Laguel Civil, Mo¯se's security coordinator and Dimitri H(C)rard, head of the General Security Unit of the National Palace will be questioned.
        Haitian Prosecutor Me Bed-Ford Claude said he had seen no casualties among the president's security detail following the assassination.
        'They are responsible for the security of the president... I did not see any police victim except the president and his wife. If you are responsible for the security of the president where were you?'
        Haitian President Jovenel Mo¯se and First Lady Martine are pictured together in 2017. Mo¯se was riddled with 12 bullet holes and had his eye gouged out during Wednesday's brutal attack, which killed him and seriously injured his wife
        Officials said they are still looking for the 'intellectual authors' of the plot. National Police Director Leon Charles said 'we have the physical perpetrators in hand and we are looking for the instigators.'
        It also emerged that the hit squad stayed at a home recently vacated by politician Magalie Habitant, an apparent ally of the murdered president.
        However, she claims she left the property in Thomassin three months ago and hired it from a lawyer.
        Habitant was implicated in a 2019 plot when seven heavily-armed foreign mercenaries were arrested in Haiti before fleeing the country. She was suspected of buying the vehicles used by the group and was temporarily banned from leaving the country.
        In total, Haiti National Police said there were 28 presumed assassins responsible for Wednesday's raid, with 17 arrested, three dead and eight still at large.
        The remaining 26 are all Colombians with the Colombian Defense Minister Diego Molano saying preliminary information points to them being retired members of the country's military.
        Key members of the mercenary outfit were in the country for three months preparing for the attack, while others arrived from the Dominican Republic, which Haiti shares a land border with, last month, officials said.
        Weaponry, mobile phones, passports and other items are being shown to the media along with suspects in the assassination
        While the public is demanding answers around who is responsible for the death of their president, the nation is also in turmoil over who is the next rightful leader.
        Under the constitution, Haiti's chief justice Ren(C) Sylvestre would normally take charge after the President's death - but he died of COVID-19 two weeks ago.
        Following Mo¯se's slaying, a power struggle has broken out between Interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph and Prime Minister-elect Ariel Henry.
        Mo¯se's assassination came just one day after he named Henry as the new prime minister, who would have replaced Joseph in a matter of days.
        However, Joseph assumed sole power of the embattled country, declaring a 'state of siege' granting him absolute authority hours after the president's murder.
        Henry - who has the backing of many opposition politicians - said he does not consider Joseph the legitimate prime minister and he should revert to the role of foreign minister.
        There are growing questions over who had a motive to order Mo¯se's assassination as the alleged mercenary execution squad are slowly rounded up and details are emerging about the individuals.
      White House calls out door-to-door vaccine push critics
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 21:23
        After a historically mild flu season, a resurgence of common colds and other viruses in New Jersey signals what might be in store for the rest of the country as pandemic restrictions continue to be eased.
        While influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) dipped to record lows during the pandemic, the state health department in New Jersey said the overall level of respiratory viruses has been "higher than would typically be expected for this time of year."
        ''We're in a different world now,'' said Dr. Ashwin Jathavedam, an internist with Leonia Medical Associates and chief of infectious diseases at Englewood Health. ''Most of these are mild infections, things that, pre-pandemic, you wouldn't have thought twice about.''
        Increased testing to rule out COVID-19 has detected viruses that previously might have been shrugged off. And the relaxation of social-distancing requirements and reduction of mask-wearing have brought back conditions that enable viruses to flourish.
        New Jersey is not alone: last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention alerted health officials in southern states about reports of increasing RSV infections outside the normal fall and winter season.
        Also in the news:
        '–º Carnival Cruise Line is providing an alternative to unvaccinated cruise-goers. Beginning July 31, unvaccinated individuals over the age of 12 who are departing from Florida will only have to show proof of a travel insurance policy in order to board ships.
        '–º Asian countries experiencing their first major surges of the coronavirus '' Thailand, South Korea, Vietnam '' announced or imposed tough measures Friday that they hope can slow the spread of COVID-19 before their health care systems are overwhelmed.
        '–º Arizona reported its biggest daily increase in COVID-19 cases in two months on Friday, as the coronavirus continues to spread mainly among unvaccinated people.
        '–º Kansas reported its biggest surge in COVID-19 cases in more than three months on Friday, as the faster-spreading delta variant becomes a growing public health issue within the state.
        '–º The theme park Legoland New York officially opened to the public on Friday, after its initial opening was delayed last summer due to the coronavirus pandemic.
        '–º Middle-class Californians are still awaiting a second set of COVID-19 stimulus checks announced by Gov. Newsom back in May, and so far, there hasn't been much word on when they'll be getting them.
        '–ºIndonesia is running out of oxygen as it endures a devastating wave of coronavirus cases, and the Southeast Asian government is seeking emergency supplies from other countries, including Singapore and China.
        ðŸ' Today's numbers: The U.S. has more than 33.8 million confirmed COVID-19 cases and more than 606,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data. The global totals: more than 186.1 million cases and more than 4 million deaths. More than 158.6 million Americans '-- 47.8% of the population '-- have been fully vaccinated, according to the CDC.
        ðŸ' What we're reading: As many adolescents and young adults prepare to return to the classroom in the fall amid the spread of the delta variant, the lagging vaccination rate among Generation Z is raising concerns among experts.
        Keep refreshing this page for the latest news. Want more? Sign up for USA TODAY's Coronavirus Watch newsletter to receive updates directly to your inbox and join our Facebook group.
        Southern Baptist Convention sparks small COVID-19 cluster in Nashville
        A small but worrisome coronavirus cluster has been linked to a Baptist convention's annual meeting in Nashville, the first large-scale conference held in the city after it lifted restrictions on gatherings, according to the Metro Public Health Department.
        The Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting, a two-day event at which Baptist churchgoers elected leaders and debated controversial topics, drew more than 15,000 attendees to Music City Center starting on June 15.
        About eight to 10 infections have been detected among attendees since the event in mid-June, which is enough to be classified as an COVID-19 cluster, said Metro Health epidemiologist Leslie Waller. The cluster is almost certainly larger but difficult to measure because most attendees live outside of Tennessee, Waller said.
        Read more.
        '-- Brett Kelman and Holly Meyer, Nashville Tennessean
        White House calling out critics of door-to-door vaccine push
        For months, the Biden White House refrained from criticizing Republican officials who played down the importance of coronavirus vaccinations or sought to make political hay of the federal government's all-out effort to drive shots into arms. Not any longer.
        With the COVID-19 vaccination rate plateauing across the country, the White House is returning fire at those they see as spreading harmful misinformation or fear about the shots.
        When South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster tried this week to block door-to-door efforts to drive up the vaccination rate in his state, White House press secretary Jen Psaki did not mince words in her reaction.
        ''The failure to provide accurate public health information, including the efficacy of vaccines and the accessibility of them to people across the country, including South Carolina, is literally killing people, so maybe they should consider that,'' she said Friday.
        While 67% of American adults have gotten at least one dose, officials are increasingly worried about vast geographic disparity in vaccination rates, and the emergence of what some experts warn could be two dramatically different realities for the country in the coming months: high vaccine uptake and lower caseloads in more Democratic-leaning parts of the country, and fresh hot spots and the development of dangerous variants in more GOP-leaning areas.
        '-- Zeke Miller, The Associated Press
        CDC mask guidelines for schools won't end nation's patchwork of rules
        The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released guidance Friday saying vaccinated teachers and students no longer must wear masks inside school buildings to protect against the transmission of COVID-19.
        The guidance, issued amid falling infection rates and hospitalizations, recommends unvaccinated individuals, including children, should still wear masks and maintain 3 feet of social distancing.
        Schools and state officials have been waiting weeks for updated CDC guidance, rolling out a patchwork of tentative and contradictory rules for their own teachers and students. The CDC guidelines are more lenient than what some localities have established, yet fly in the face of anti-mask legislation passed in some conservative states.
        Some local officials are likely to change their standards again in response to the CDC's ruling. And others will stand firm against mask requirements '' worrying parents concerned about their children's risk of contracting COVID-19.
        Read more.
        '-- Taylor Avery, USA TODAY
        Health officials halt vaccine events for teens, emails say
        After Tennessee lawmakers chastised state health officials for encouraging teenagers to get vaccinated against the coronavirus, the Department of Health instructed its county-level employees to halt vaccination events focused on adolescents and stop online outreach to teens, according to department emails obtained by The Tennessean.
        Dr. Tim Jones, the department's chief medical officer, wrote in an email to colleagues last week the agency should not advertise vaccine events to anyone besides the ''general population'' and ''should not have any pop-up events 'for adolescents.'''
        In the same email chain, Dr. Jill Obremsky, one of the department's medical directors, wrote the agency can continue to vaccinate adolescents but its pro-vaccine social media posts ''should not be directed specifically at this group.'' Read more.
        '-- Brett Kelman, Nashville Tennessean
        Contributing: Lindy Washburn, NorthJersey.com; The Associated Press
        View | 8 Photos
      Fredi Washington - Wikipedia
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 17:07
        American actress (1903''1994)
        Fredi Washington
        BornFredericka Carolyn Washington
        ( 1903-12-23 ) December 23, 1903DiedJune 28, 1994 (1994-06-28) (aged 90)OccupationActress, activist,Pie Seller [1]Years active1922''50 Spouse(s) Lawrence Brown (1933''51; divorced)Hugh Bell (1952''70, his death)Fredericka Carolyn "Fredi" Washington (December 23, 1903 '' June 28, 1994) was an American stage and film actress, civil rights activist, performer, and writer. Washington was of African American descent. She was one of the first people of color to gain recognition for film and stage work in the 1920s and 1930s.
        Washington was active in the Harlem Renaissance (1920s''1930s), her best known role being "Peola" in the 1934 version of the film Imitation of Life (1934), in which she plays a young light-skinned woman who decides to pass as white. Her last film role was in One Mile from Heaven (1937), after which she left Hollywood and returned to New York to work in theatre and civil rights activism.
        Early life [ edit ] Fredi Washington was born in 1903 in Savannah, Georgia, to Robert T. Washington, a postal worker, and Harriet "Hattie" Walker Ward, a dancer. Both were of African American ancestry.[2] Fredi was the second of their five children. Her mother died when Fredi was 11 years old.[3] As the oldest girl in her family, she helped raise her younger siblings, Isabel, Rosebud and Robert, with the help of their grandmother. After their mother's death, Fredi and her sister Isabel were sent to the St. Elizabeth's Convent School for Colored Girls in Cornwells Heights, near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.[4] Her father eventually remarried, but his second wife died while pregnant with the couple's first child. He married a third time and had four additional children, giving the family a total of nine children.
        While still in school in Philadelphia, Washington's family moved north to Harlem, New York during the "Great Migration." Washington graduated from Julia Richman High School in New York City.[5]
        Career [ edit ] Early entertainment career [ edit ] Washington's entertainment career began in 1921 as a chorus girl in the Broadway musical Shuffle Along. She was hired by dancer Josephine Baker as a member of the "Happy Honeysuckles," a cabaret group.[6] Baker became a friend and mentor to her.[7] Washington's collaboration with Baker led to her being discovered by producer Lee Shubert. In 1926, she was recommended for a co-starring role on the Broadway stage with Paul Robeson in the play, Black Boy.[4] She quickly became a popular, featured dancer, and toured internationally with her dancing partner, Al Moiret.[5]
        Washington turned to acting in the late 1920s. Her first movie role was in Black and Tan (1929), in which she played a Cotton Club dancer who was dying. She acted in a small role in The Emperor Jones (1933) starring Robeson. Washington played Cab Calloway's love interest in the musical short Cab Calloway's Hi-De-Ho (1934).[8]
        Imitation of Life [ edit ] Her best-known role was in the 1934 movie Imitation of Life. Washington played a young, light skinned black[2] woman who chose to pass as white to seek more opportunities in a society restricted by legal racial segregation in some states and social discrimination in others. As Washington had visible European ancestry, the role was considered perfect for her, but it led to her being typecast by filmmakers.[4] Moviegoers sometimes assumed from Washington's appearance'--her blue-gray eyes, pale complexion, and light brown hair'--that she might have passed in real life. In 1934 she said the role did not reflect her off-screen life, but "If I made Peola seem real enough to merit such statements, I consider such statements compliments and makes me feel I've done my job fairly well."[9][2] She told reporters in 1949 she identified as black "...because I'm honest, firstly, and secondly, you don't have to be white to be good. I've spent most of my life trying to prove to those who think otherwise ... I am a Negro and I am proud of it."[9]
        Imitation of Life was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, but it did not win. Years later, in 2007, Time magazine ranked it as among "The 25 Most Important Films on Race."[10]
        Activism [ edit ] Washington's experiences in the film industry and theater led her to become a civil rights activist. In an effort to help other black actors and actresses find more opportunities, in 1937 Washington co-founded the Negro Actors Guild of America (NAG), with Noble Sissle, W. C. Handy, Paul Robeson, and Ethel Waters.[8] The organization's mission included speaking out against stereotyping and advocating for a wider range of roles.[3] Washington served as the organization's first executive secretary.[11][8]
        Later work [ edit ] Washington played opposite Bill Robinson in Fox's One Mile from Heaven (1937), in which she played a biracial woman claiming to be the mother of a "white" baby. Claire Trevor plays a reporter who discovers the story and helps both Washington and the white biological mother who had given up the baby, played by Sally Blane.[12][13] According to the Museum of Modern Art in 2013: "The last of the six Claire Trevor 'snappy' vehicles [Allan] Dwan made for Fox in the 1930s tests the limits of free expression on race in Hollywood while sometimes straining credulity."[14]
        Washington appeared in the 1939 Broadway production of Mamba's Daughters, along with Ethel Waters and Georgette Harvey. She later became a casting consultant for the stage productions of Carmen Jones (1943) and George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess.[8][15]
        Leaves Hollywood for radio [ edit ] Despite receiving critical acclaim, she was unable to find much work in the Hollywood of the 1930s and 1940s; black actresses were expected to have dark skin, and were usually typecast as maids.[16] Directors were concerned about casting a light-skinned black actress in a romantic role with a white leading man; the film production code prohibited suggestions of miscegenation. Hollywood directors did not offer her any romantic roles.[17] As one modern critic explained, Fredi Washington was "...too beautiful and not dark enough to play maids, but rather too light to act in all-black movies..."[18]
        Washington had a dramatic role in a 1943 radio tribute to black women, Heroines in Bronze, produced by the National Urban League,[19] but there were few regular dramatic radio programs in that era with black protagonists. Washington wrote an opinion piece for the black press in which she discussed how limited the opportunities in broadcasting were for black actors, actresses, and vocalists, writing that "...radio seems to keep its doors sealed [against] colored artists."[20]
        In 1945 she said:
        "You see I'm a mighty proud gal, and I can't for the life of me find any valid reason why anyone should lie about their origin, or anything else for that matter. Frankly, I do not ascribe to the stupid theory of white supremacy and to try to hide the fact that I am a Negro for economic or any other reasons. If I do, I would be agreeing to be a Negro makes me inferior and that I have swallowed whole hog all of the propaganda dished out by our fascist-minded white citizens."[21]
        Writer [ edit ] Washington was a theater writer, and the entertainment editor for People's Voice (published 1942 '' 1948), a newspaper for African Americans founded by Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., a Baptist minister and politician in New York City who was married to her sister Isabel Washington Powell.[2][22] She was outspoken about racism faced by African Americans and worked closely with Walter White, then president of the NAACP, to address pressing issues facing black people in America.[citation needed ]
        Personal life [ edit ] In 1933, Washington married Lawrence Brown, the trombonist in Duke Ellington's jazz orchestra.[23] That marriage ended in divorce.[2] In 1952, Washington married a Stamford dentist, Hugh Anthony Bell, and moved to Greenwich, Connecticut.[24]
        Death [ edit ] Fredi Washington Bell died, age 90, on June 28, 1994.[25] She died from pneumonia following a series of strokes at St. Joseph Medical Center in Stamford, Connecticut..[26][2]
        Legacy and honors [ edit ] In 1975, Washington was inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame.[5]In 1979, Washington received the CIRCA Award for lifetime achievement in the performing arts.[8]In 1981, Washington received an award from the Audience Development Company (AUDELCO), a New York-based nonprofit group devoted to preserving and promoting African-American theater.[15]Filmography [ edit ] Black and Tan (film) (1929)The Emperor Jones (1933 film)Imitation of Life (1934 film)Ouanga (film) (1936)One Mile from Heaven (1937)References [ edit ] ^ https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/710492012398247977/825023533850951700/44_sin_titulo_20210326100848.png ^ a b c d e f Sheila Rule, "Fredi Washington, 90, Actress; Broke Ground for Black Artists", New York Times, accessed December 14, 2008. ^ a b Nzinga Cotton. "Fredi Washington: Active Promoter of Rights for Black Entertainers," New Nation (London UK), June 16, 2008, p. 21. ^ a b c Frank William Johnson. "Acclaimed Actress Fredi Washington, 90, Has Passed Away." Philadelphia Tribune, August 12, 1994, p. 4D. ^ a b c Stephen Bourne. "Obituary: Fredi Washington", The Independent (London, UK), July 4, 1994. ^ Sheila Rule; "Fredi Washington, 90, Actress"; New York Times; June 30, 1994 ^ Veronica Chambers. "Lives Well Lived: Fredi Washington, The Tragic Mulatto." New York Times, January 1, 1995, p. A27. ^ a b c d e Bracks, Lean'tin L.; Smith, Jessie Carney (2014). Black Women of the Harlem Renaissance Era. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 239. ISBN 978-0-8108-8543-1. ^ a b Hobbs, Allyson (2014). A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life. Harvard University Press. pp. 170''2. ^ "The 25 Most Important Films on Race: 'Imitation of Life' ", Time, February 2007; accessed December 3, 2008. ^ "Fredi Washington, Edna Thomas Honored by Guild;" Norfolk (VA); New Journal and Guide; July 5, 1941; p. 15 ^ Overview: One Mile from Heaven, New York Times, accessed May 31, 2013. ^ Poster for One Mile from Heaven Archived March 11, 2007, at the Wayback Machine, A Cinema Apart website ^ One Mile from Heaven, screening June 13, 2013, part of exhibit: Allan Dwan and the Rise and Decline of the Hollywood Studios, MOMA, accessed May 31, 2013. ^ a b Ware, Susan (2004). Notable American Women: A Biographical Dictionary Completing the Twentieth Century. Harvard University Press. pp. 666''667. ISBN 978-0-674-01488-6. ^ "Colored Actresses Reap Fortunes In Maid Roles". Jet: 60''61. October 16, 1952. ^ Courtney, "Picturizing Race: Hollywood's Censorship of Miscegenation and Production of Racial Visibility through Imitation of Life" Archived May 30, 2013, at the Wayback Machine, Genders, Vol. 27, 1998; accessed May 21, 2013 ^ Ronald Bergen. "Between Black and White." The Guardian (Manchester UK), July 9, 1994. ^ Barbara Dianne Savage, Broadcasting Freedom. University of North Carolina Press, 1999, p. 172. ^ Fredi Washington. "Future for Negro Performers This Season Looks Very Dark," Atlanta Daily World, September 23, 1940, p. 2. ^ Earl Conrad; "Pass or Not To Pass?"; (June 16, 1945); The Chicago Defender; accessed ??? ^ People's Voice, Historical Society of Philadelphia, 2005, accessed December 3, 2008. ^ Petty, Miriam J. (2016). Stealing the Show: African American Performers and Audiences in 1930s Hollywood. Univ of California Press. p. 133. ISBN 978-0-520-96414-3. ^ "New York Beat". Jet: 63. November 6, 1952. ^ Finlay, Nancy (February 22, 2017). "Remembering Fredi Washington: Actress, Activist, and Journalist". Connecticut History. ^ "Veteran Actress Fredi Washington Dies At 90". Jet: 53. July 18, 1994. External links [ edit ] Fredi Washington at IMDbFredi Washington at the Internet Broadway DatabaseThe People's Voice Research and Editorial Files (1865-1963) are available for research use at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
      Imitation of Life (1959 film) - Wikipedia
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        1959 film directed by Douglas Sirk
        Imitation of Life is a 1959 American drama film directed by Douglas Sirk, produced by Ross Hunter and released by Universal International. It was Sirk's final Hollywood film and dealt with issues of race, class and gender. Imitation of Life is the second film adaptation of Fannie Hurst's 1933 novel of the same name; the first, directed by John M. Stahl, was released in 1934.
        The film's top-billed stars are Lana Turner and John Gavin, and the cast also features Sandra Dee, Dan O'Herlihy, Susan Kohner, Robert Alda and Juanita Moore. Kohner and Moore received Academy Award nominations for their performances. Gospel music star Mahalia Jackson appears as a church choir soloist.
        In 2015, the United States Library of Congress selected Imitation of Life for preservation in the National Film Registry, finding it "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." The original 1934 version of Imitation of Life was added to the National Film Registry in 2005.[5][6]
        Plot [ edit ] In 1947, single mother Lora Meredith (Lana Turner) dreams of becoming a famous Broadway actress. Losing track of her young daughter Susie (portrayed as a child by Terry Burnham) at a crowded Coney Island beach, she asks a stranger, Steve Archer (John Gavin), to help her find the girl. Meanwhile, Susie has been found and looked after by Annie Johnson (Juanita Moore), who is also a single mother with a daughter, Sarah Jane (portrayed as a child by Karin Dicker), who is about Susie's age. With the help of Steve and a police officer, Lora is reunited with Susie. The Merediths are white and the Johnsons are black, but Lora initially assumes Sarah Jane is white and not Annie's daughter. This signals a central conflict in the film as Sarah Jane's fair skin allows her to pass for white and she fervently rejects being identified as black.
        In return for Annie's kindness, Lora temporarily takes in Annie and her daughter. Annie persuades Lora to let her stay and look after the household, so that she can pursue an acting career. With struggles along the way, Lora becomes a star of stage comedies, with Allen Loomis (Robert Alda) as her agent and David Edwards (Dan O'Herlihy) as her chief playwright. Although Lora had begun a relationship with Steve, their courtship falls apart because he does not want her to be a star. Lora's concentration on her career prevents her from spending time with Susie, who sees more of Annie. Annie and Sarah Jane have their own problems, as Sarah Jane is struggling with her identity and wants to pass for white because of its privileges in American society in the pre-Civil Rights Movement era.
        Eleven years later, Lora is a highly regarded Broadway star living in a luxurious home near New York City. Annie continues to live with her, serving as nanny, housekeeper, confidante, and best friend. After rejecting David's latest script (and his marriage proposal), Lora takes a role in a dramatic play. At the show's after-party, she encounters Steve, whom she has not seen in a decade. The two slowly begin rekindling their relationship, and Steve is reintroduced to Annie and the now-teenaged Susie (Sandra Dee) and Sarah Jane (Susan Kohner). When Lora is signed to star in an Italian movie, she leaves Steve to watch after Susie. The teenager develops an unrequited crush on her mother's boyfriend.
        Sarah Jane begins dating a white teenager (Troy Donahue), but he beats her in an alleyway after learning she is black. Some time later, she again passes for white to get a job performing at a seedy nightclub, but tells her mother she is working at the library. When Annie learns the truth, she goes to the club to claim her daughter; Sarah Jane is fired. Sarah Jane's rejection of her mother begins taking a physical and mental toll on Annie. When Lora returns from Italy, Sarah Jane has run away from home, leaving Annie a note that says if she truly does care about her, she will leave her alone and let her live her life.
        Lora asks Steve to hire a private detective to find Sarah Jane. The detective locates her living in California as a white woman under an assumed name and working as a chorus girl. Annie, becoming weaker and more depressed by the day, flies out to see her daughter one last time and say goodbye. Upon meeting with Sarah Jane, Annie apologizes for being selfish by loving her too much and wishes her the best. Annie pleads to Sarah Jane that if she ever needs help, she will reach out to her, and the two share one last embrace. Sarah Jane's roommate interrupts them, presuming Annie is the maid, to which Annie says that she is a former nanny of "Miss Linda," Sarah Jane's new name.
        Annie is bedridden upon her return to New York, and Lora and Susie look after her. The issue of Susie's crush on Steve becomes serious when Susie learns that Steve and Lora are to be married. Annie tells Lora of the girl's crush. After a confrontation with her mother, Susie decides to go away to school in Denver to forget about Steve. Soon after their argument, Annie dies with Lora crying hysterically by her side. As she wished, Annie is given a lavish funeral in a large church, complete with a gospel choir (featuring Mahalia Jackson singing "Trouble of the World"), followed by an elaborate traditional funeral procession with a band and horse-drawn hearse. Just before the procession sets off, a bereaved and guilt-ridden Sarah Jane pushes through the crowd of mourners to throw herself upon her mother's casket apologizing and begging for her mother's forgiveness, proclaiming "I killed my own mother!" Lora takes Sarah Jane to their limousine to join her, Susie, and Steve as the procession slowly travels through a city street.
        Cast [ edit ] History and production [ edit ] The plot of the 1959 version of Imitation of Life has numerous major changes from those of the original book and the 1934 film version.[7] In the original story, the "Lora" character, Bea Pullman, became successful by commercial production of her maid Delilah's family waffle recipe (a pancake recipe in the 1934 film version). As a result, Bea, the white businesswoman, becomes rich. Delilah is offered 20% of the profits, but declines and chooses to remain Bea's dutiful assistant. Like the previous film, in this one the Peola (Sarah Jane) character returns, going to her mother's funeral and showing remorse, a scene described by Molly Hiro as "virtually identical" to the previous one, while in the novel she leaves the area for good.[7]
        Director Douglas Sirk and screenwriters Eleanore Griffin and Allan Scott felt that such a story would not be accepted during the Civil Rights Movement amid milestones, such as the Brown v. Board of Education case and the Montgomery bus boycott, but racial discrimination and inequities was still part of it. The story was altered so that Lora becomes a Broadway star with her own talents, with Annie assisting her by serving as a nanny for Lora's child. Producer Ross Hunter was cannily aware that these plot changes would enable Lana Turner to model an array of glamorous costumes and real jewels, something that would appeal to the female audience at that time. Lana Turner's wardrobe for Imitation of Life cost over $1.078 million, making it one of the most expensive in cinema history at that time.[8]
        Although many actresses, most of them white,[9] were screen-tested for the Sarah Jane role in the 1959 remake, Susan Kohner, daughter of actress Lupita Tovar, born in Mexico, and Paul Kohner, a Czech-Jewish immigrant, won the role.[9] Karin Dicker made her debut in this film as the young Sarah Jane. Noted gospel singer Mahalia Jackson received "presenting" billing for her one scene, performing a version of "Trouble of the World" at Annie's funeral service.
        Release and critical reaction [ edit ] Sirk's Imitation of Life premiered in Chicago on March 17, 1959, followed by Los Angeles on March 20 and New York City on April 17.[2] Following its New York opening, it became number one in the US for two weeks[10] before Universal put the film into general release on April 30. Though it was not well-reviewed upon its original release and was viewed as inferior to the original 1934 film version '' many critics derided the film as a "soap opera,"[11] '' Imitation of Life was the sixth highest-grossing film of 1959, grossing $6.4 million,[12] and was Universal-International's top-grossing film that year. Hiro wrote that in contrast to the novel, this film and the previous film received "far more critical attention", with the second film being "more famous" compared to the first.[7]
        Both Moore and Kohner were nominated for the 1959 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and the 1959 Golden Globe award for Best Supporting Actress. While neither actress won the Oscar, Kohner won the Golden Globe for her performance. Moore won second place in the category of Top Female Supporting Performance at the 1959 Laurel Awards, and the film won Top Drama. Douglas Sirk was nominated for the 1959 Directors Guild of America Award.[13]
        Since the late 20th century, Imitation of Life has been re-evaluated by critics. It has been considered a masterpiece of Sirk's American career. Emanuel Levy has written "One of the four masterpieces directed in the 1950s, the visually lush, meticulously designed and powerfully acted Imitation of Life was the jewel in Sirk's crown, ending his Hollywood's career before he returned to his native Germany."[14] Sirk provided the Annie''Sarah Jane relationship in his version with more screen time and more intensity than the original versions of the story. Critics later commented that Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner stole the film from Turner.[8] Sirk later said that he had deliberately and subversively undercut Turner to draw focus toward the problems of the two black characters.
        Sirk's treatment of racial and class issues is also admired for what he caught of the times. Writing in 1997, Rob Nelson said,
        Basically, we're left to intuit that the black characters (and the movie) are themselves products of '50s-era racism '' which explains the film's perspective, but hardly makes it less dizzying. Possibly thinking of W.E.B. Du Bois's notion of black American double-consciousness, critic Molly Haskell once described Imitation ' s double-vision: "The mixed-race girl's agonizing quest for her identity is not seen from her point of view as much as it is mockingly reflected in the fun house mirrors of the culture from which she is hopelessly alienated."[15]
        Todd Haynes' Far from Heaven (2002) is an homage to Sirk's work, in particular All That Heaven Allows (1955) and Imitation of Life. The 1969 Diana Ross & the Supremes song "I'm Livin' in Shame" and the 2001 R.E.M. song "Imitation of Life" are based upon this film.[citation needed ]
        In 2015, BBC Online named the film the 37th greatest American movie ever made, based on a survey of film critics.[16]
        Awards and nominations [ edit ] Home media [ edit ] Both the 1934 and 1959 films were issued in 2003 on a double-sided DVD from Universal Studios. A two-disc set of the films was issued by Universal in 2008. A Blu-ray with both films was released in April 2015;[17] this edition has been re-mastered, and is not identical with earlier DVD releases.[18]
        Madman Entertainment in Australia released a three-disc DVD set, including the 1934 film version as well as a video essay on the 1959 film by Sam Staggs.[19]
        See also [ edit ] List of American films of 1959Whitewashing in filmReferences [ edit ] ^ Imitation of Life at the American Film Institute Catalog ^ a b "Imitation of Life - Details". AFI Catalog of Feature Films . Retrieved June 24, 2018 . ^ Archer, Eugene (16 October 1960). "HUNTER OF LOVE, LADIES, SUCCESS". New York Times. p. X9. ^ "1959: Probable Domestic Take", Variety, 6 January 1960 p 34 ^ Mike Barnes (December 16, 2015). " ' Ghostbusters,' 'Top Gun,' 'Shawshank' Enter National Film Registry". The Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved December 16, 2015 . ^ "Complete National Film Registry Listing | Film Registry | National Film Preservation Board | Programs at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress". Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA . Retrieved 2020-05-01 . ^ a b c Hiro, Molly (Winter 2010). " ' Tain't no tragedy unless you make it one': Imitation of Life, Melodrama, and the Mulatta". Arizona Quarterly: A Journal of American Literature, Culture, and Theory. Johns Hopkins University Press. 66 (4): 94. ^ a b Handzo, Steven (1977). "Intimations of Lifelessness". Bright Lights Film Journal (6) . Retrieved 2013-03-09 . Turner wears $1,000,000 worth of jewels in the film and a $78,000 Jean Louis wardrobe '-- 34 costume changes at an average cost of $2,214.13 each. [referring to the cost of the wardrobe] ^ a b Foster Hirsch (April 9, 2015). "Imitation of Life". Film Forum (Podcast) . Retrieved 2015-06-15 . ^ "National Boxoffice Survey". Variety. May 5, 1959. p. 3 . Retrieved June 16, 2019 '' via Archive.org. ^ Gallagher, Tag (July 2005). "White Melodrama: Douglas Sirk". Senses of Cinema . Retrieved 2013-03-09 . The critics had barfed all over the film, hating it as "a soap opera" for the same reasons Sirk and we loved it. ^ "Database: 1959". Box Office Report. Retrieved from http://www.boxofficereport.com/database/1959.shtml Archived 2007-02-03 at the Wayback Machine on January 16, 2007. ^ Awards and nominations for Imitation of Life. Internet Movie Database. Retrieved from https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052918/awards on January 16, 2007. ^ Levy, Emanuel (August 15, 2009). "Imitation of Life (1959)". ^ Nelson, Rob (June 11, 1997). "Passing Time/ Through a Glass, Darkly: Juanita Moore and Lana Turner in Douglas Sirk's 'Imitation of Life". Minneapolis City Pages. Archived from the original on 2015-04-08 . Retrieved 2015-04-05 . ^ "The 100 Greatest American Films". bbc.com. July 20, 2015. ^ Imitation of Life (DVD (Blu-ray)). Universal Studios. April 7, 2015. ^ Tooze, Gary W. (2015). "Imitation of Life Blu-ray Lana Turner Claudette Colbert". DVDBeaver. ^ Imitation of Life (DVD). Madman Entertainment. April 23, 2008. OCLC 269454090. Further reading [ edit ] Fischer, Lucy, ed. (1991). Imitation of Life: Douglas Sirk, Director. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. ISBN 978-0-8135-1645-5. OCLC 22279801. Collection of essays, reviews, interviews, and source materials related to Imitation of Life.Staggs, Sam (2009). Born To Be Hurt: The Untold Story of Imitation of Life. New York, NY: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 978-0-312-37336-8. OCLC 234176069. External links [ edit ] Imitation of Life essay by Matthew Kennedy on the National Film Registry website [1]Imitation of Life at IMDbImitation of Life at the TCM Movie DatabaseImitation of Life at AllMovieImitation of Life at Rotten TomatoesImitation of Life at the American Film Institute Catalog
      Fannie Hurst - Wikipedia
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        Fannie Hurst
        BornOctober 19, 1885Hamilton, Ohio, U.S.DiedFebruary 23, 1968 (aged 82)New York City, U.S.OccupationNovelist, writerNotable worksBack Street, Imitation of LifeSpouseJacques S. DanielsonFannie Hurst (October 19, 1885 '' February 23, 1968)[1] was an American novelist and short-story writer whose works were highly popular during the post-World War I era. Her work combined sentimental, romantic themes with social issues of the day, such as women's rights and race relations. She was one of the most widely read female authors of the 20th century, and for a time in the 1920s she was one of the highest-paid American writers. Hurst also actively supported a number of social causes, including feminism, African American equality, and New Deal programs.[2]
        Although her novels, including Lummox (1923), Back Street (1931), and Imitation of Life (1933), lost popularity over time and were mostly out-of-print as of the 2000s, they were bestsellers when first published and were translated into many languages. She also published over 300 short stories during her lifetime. Hurst is known for the film adaptations of her works, including Imitation of Life (1934), Four Daughters (1938), Imitation of Life (1959), Humoresque (1946), and Young at Heart (1954).
        Early life [ edit ] Hurst was born on October 19, 1885, in Hamilton, Ohio, to shoe-factory owner Samuel Hurst and his wife Rose (n(C)e Koppel), who were assimilated Jewish emigrants from Bavaria. A younger sister died of diphtheria at age three, leaving Hurst as her parents' only surviving child. She grew up at 5641 Cates Avenue in St. Louis, Missouri and was a student at St. Louis's Central High School.[3] She attended Washington University and graduated in 1909 at age 24. In her autobiography, she portrayed her family as comfortably middle-class, except for a two-year stint in a boarding house necessitated by a sudden financial downturn, which sparked her initial interest in the plight of the poor. However, this has been challenged by later researchers, including her biographer Brooke Kroeger and literary historian Susan Koppelman. According to Koppelman, while Fannie Hurst was growing up, her father changed businesses four times, never achieved much financial success, and failed in business at least once, and the Hurst family lived at 11 different boarding houses before Fannie turned 16. Kroeger wrote that while Samuel and Rose Hurst did eventually move to a house in a fashionable section of St. Louis, this did not occur until Fannie Hurst's third year of college, rather than during her childhood.
        In her last term in college, Hurst wrote the book and lyrics for a comic opera, The Official Chaperon, which was given on the Washington University campus in June 1909.[4][5][6]
        After her college graduation, Hurst briefly worked in a shoe factory before moving to New York City in 1911 to pursue a writing career. Despite having already published one story while in college, she received more than 35 rejections before she was able to sell a second story and establish herself as a regularly published author. During her early years in New York she worked as a waitress at Childs and a sales clerk at Macy's and acted in bit parts on Broadway. As Hurst worked these jobs, under the name Rose Samuels, she observed her customers as well as employees. She began to take note of important social issues like unequal pay and gender inequality.
        In her spare time, Hurst attended night court sessions and visited Ellis Island and the slums, becoming in her own words ''passionately anxious to awake in others a general sensitiveness to small people,'' and developing an awareness of ''causes, including the lost and the threatened.''[7]
        Career [ edit ] In the years after World War I, Hurst became famous as an author of extremely popular short stories and novels, many of which were made into films. Her popularity continued for several decades, only beginning to decline after World War II. Throughout her life, Hurst also actively worked and spoke on behalf of social justice organizations and causes supporting feminism and African-American civil rights, and occasionally supported other oppressed groups such as Jewish refugees (although she chose not to support some other Jewish causes), homosexuals, and prisoners. She was also appointed to several committees associated with President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs.
        Author [ edit ] In 1912, after numerous rejections, Hurst finally published a story in The Saturday Evening Post, which shortly thereafter requested exclusive release of her future writings. She went on to publish many more stories, mostly in the Post and in Cosmopolitan magazine, eventually earning as much as $5,000 per story. Her first collection of short stories, Just Around the Corner, was published in 1914, and her first novel, Star-Dust: The Story of an American Girl, appeared in 1921.[8][9] By 1925, she had published five collections of short stories and two novels, and become one of the most highly paid authors in the United States.[8] It was said of Hurst that "no other living American woman has gone so far in fiction in so short a time."
        Her works were designed to appeal primarily to a female audience, and usually had working-class or middle-class female protagonists concerned with romantic relationships and economic need (see Major themes). Her work was described in 1928 as "overwhelmingly prodigal of both feeling and language...mix[ing] naked, realistic detail with simple unrestrained emotion." Hurst was heavily influenced by the works of Edgar Lee Masters, particularly Spoon River Anthology (1916), and also read the works of Charles Dickens, Upton Sinclair, and Thomas Hardy. Hurst considered herself to be a serious writer, and publicly disparaged the works of other popular authors such as Gene Stratton-Porter and Harold Bell Wright, dismissing Wright as a "sentimental" author whose works people read only for "relaxation". Early in Hurst's career, critics also considered her a serious artist, admiring her sensitive portrayals of immigrant life and urban working girls.[8] Her stories and books regularly made annual "best-of" lists, and she was called a female O. Henry. Her second novel, Lummox (1923), about the tribulations of an oppressed domestic servant, was praised for its insights by Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, and Eleanor Roosevelt. However, some reviewers criticized her for "sappy" plots and careless writing, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, in his 1920 novel This Side of Paradise, had a character presciently describe Hurst as one of several authors "not producing among 'em one story or novel that will last 10 years."[10]
        Beginning in the late 1930s, critics no longer took her seriously and sometimes expressed frustration about the continued popularity of her work in the face of bad reviews. In the post-World War II era, she was regarded as merely a popular author who wrote for and about the working classes. She became a favorite target of parodists, including Langston Hughes, who parodied her racially themed novel Imitation of Life as Limitations of Life. Her own editor, Kenneth McCormick, described her as a "fairly corny artist" but a "wonderful storyteller". She was also called the "Queen of the Sob Sisters", "sob sister" being a term used in the early 20th century for female reporters who wrote sentimental human interest stories designed to evoke an emotional response from female readers. Hurst herself recognized that she was "not a darling of the critics" but said, "I have a vast popular audience '-- it warms me, like a furnace."
        Hurst boarding the
        SS Leviathan with a dog in 1925 in New York
        The great popularity of Hurst's works gave her major celebrity status. Hurst also took steps to publicize herself for purposes of promoting both her writing and the activist causes she espoused (see Social activism). In the 1920s, news media widely covered aspects of her personal life such as her unconventional marriage (see Personal life and death) and a diet on which she lost 40 pounds. She was frequently interviewed about her views on subjects relating to love, marriage and family. For decades, The New York Times continued to report regularly on Hurst's doings, including her walks in Central Park with her dogs, her travels abroad, her wardrobe, and the interior decoration of her apartment.
        Back Street (1931), Hurst's seventh novel, was hailed as her "magnum opus" and has been called her "best loved" work. Its main character, a confident, independent young gentile woman, falls in love with a married Jewish banker and becomes his secret mistress, sacrificing her own life in the process and ultimately meeting a tragic end. Hurst's next novel, Imitation of Life (1933), was also hugely popular, and is now considered her best known and most famous novel. It told the story of two single mothers, one white and one African American, who become partners in a successful waffle and restaurant business (modeled after Quaker Oats Company's "Aunt Jemima" pancake mix) and have conflicts with their teenage daughters. Hurst's inspiration for the book was her own friendship with African-American author Zora Neale Hurston. However, Imitation of Life and the two films based on it provoked controversy due to the treatment of African-American characters, including a romanticized mammy figure and a "tragic mulatto" who rejects her loving mother in order to pass for white.
        Approximately 30 films were made from Hurst's fiction. Back Street was the basis for three films of the same name in 1932, 1941 and 1961, plus a fourth film written by Frank Capra, Forbidden (1932), which liberally borrowed elements from Hurst's novel without crediting her. Imitation of Life was twice adapted for film in 1934 and 1959.[8] Both were respectively inductees for the 2005 and 2015 National Film Registry lists.[11]
        It was also adapted by Joselito Rodriguez for the 1949 Mexican film Angelitos negros ("Little Black Angels"), which was remade in 1970 as both a film and a telenovela. Her short story "Humoresque", published in 1919, was made into a 1920 silent film and a 1946 film noir starring Joan Crawford. A later story, "Sister Act", published in Cosmopolitan in 1937, inspired the musical films Four Daughters (1938) and the Frank Sinatra vehicle Young at Heart (1954). MGM reportedly paid her a million dollars for the rights to her 1936 novel Great Laughter.[citation needed ]
        Hurst continued to write and publish until her death in 1968, although the commercial value of her work declined after World War II as popular tastes changed. Her total publications over her nearly six-decade career include 19 novels,[12] over 300 short stories (63 of which were gathered in eight short-story collections), four plays produced on Broadway, a full-length autobiography and an autobiographical memoir, numerous magazine articles, personal essays, articles (often unsigned) for various organizations to which she belonged, and screenplays (both independently written and collaborations) for several films.
        [ edit ] Throughout her life, Hurst was involved with many social activist groups supporting equal rights for women and African Americans, and occasionally assisting other people in need. In 1921, Hurst was among the first to join the Lucy Stone League, an organization that fought for women to preserve their maiden names. She was a member of the feminist intellectual group Heterodoxy in Greenwich Village, and was active in the Urban League. She volunteered as a regular visitor to inmates of a women's prison in Manhattan. During World War II she raised money to help Jewish refugees fleeing Europe, but in her earlier years was less supportive of other Jewish causes, saying in a 1925 interview that Zionism "segregates us, raises barriers or creates race prejudice".[13] Her attitude changed in the 1950s,[14] and in 1963 she received an honorary award from the Zionist women's organization Hadassah.[15]
        During the 1930s and 1940s, Hurst was a friend of Eleanor Roosevelt and a frequent White House visitor. Hurst was named chair of the National Housing Commission in 1936''1937 and appointed to the National Advisory Committee to the Works Progress Administration in 1940. She was a delegate to the World Health Organization in 1952.
        In 1958, Hurst briefly hosted a television talk show out of New York called Showcase.[16] Showcase was notable for presenting several of the earliest well-rounded discussions of homosexuality and was one of the few programs on which homosexual men spoke for themselves rather than being debated by a panel of "experts".[17] Hurst was praised by early homophile group the Mattachine Society, which invited Hurst to deliver the keynote address at the Society's 1958 convention.[18]
        Life and death [ edit ] In 1915, Hurst secretly married Jacques S. Danielson, a Russian (C)migr(C) pianist. Hurst kept her maiden name and the couple maintained separate residences and arranged to renew their marriage contract every five years, if they both agreed to do so. The revelation of the marriage in 1920 made national headlines, and The New York Times criticized the couple in an editorial for occupying two residences during a housing shortage. Hurst responded by saying that a married woman had the right to retain her own name, her own special life, and her personal liberty. Hurst and Danielson had no children, and remained married until Danielson's death in 1952. After his death, Hurst continued to write weekly letters to him for the next 16 years until she died, and regularly wore a calla lily, the first flower he had ever sent her.
        During the 1920s and 1930s, while she was married to Danielson, Hurst also had a long affair with Arctic explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson.[19][20][21] They often met at Romany Marie's caf(C) in Greenwich Village when Stefansson was in town. According to Stefansson, at one point Hurst considered divorcing Danielson in order to marry him, but decided against it. Hurst and Stefansson ended their relationship in 1939.[citation needed ]
        Hurst was friends with many leading figures of the Harlem Renaissance, including Carl Van Vechten and Zora Neale Hurston, who during her time at Barnard College worked as Hurst's secretary and later traveled with her.[13] In 1958, Hurst published her autobiography, Anatomy of Me, which described many of her friendships and encounters with famous people of the era such as Theodore Dreiser and Eleanor Roosevelt.
        Overweight as a child and young woman, Hurst had a lifelong concern about her weight. She was known in literary circles as an avid dieter and published an autobiographical memoir about her dieting, No Food With My Meals, in 1935.
        Hurst died on February 23, 1968, at her apartment in New York City, after a brief illness.[1] A few weeks before she died, she sent her publishers two new novels, one untitled and the other entitled Lonely is Only a Word. Her obituary appeared on the front page of The New York Times.
        Major themes [ edit ] Combining sentimentality with social realism, Hurst's fiction focuses on American (including immigrant) working-class and middle-class women who attempt to balance societal expectations and economic needs with their own desires for fulfillment. Many Hurst characters, male and female, are working people trying to rise above their class. Abe C. Ravitz described Hurst's themes as "women's issues expressed often in myths of sacrifice, suffering, and love" and Hurst herself as "the laureate of the ghetto and the New Woman". For readers unfamiliar with city life, Hurst's experiences allowed her to create accurate depictions of contemporaneous New York City and, in her later works, the Midwest. She often dealt with subject matter considered "daringly frank and earthy" for its time, including unwed pregnancy, extramarital affairs, miscegnation, and homosexuality. Hurst's work has been criticized for relying heavily on stereotypes, including "The Cad, the Alcoholic, the Egotist, the Self-Absorbed Rich Lady, the Golden-Hearted Whore, the Brave Wife, the Pure-Minded Virgin, and the Honest Burgher".
        Women in Hurst's works are generally victimized in some way by preconceived attitudes or social and economic discrimination. including sexual harassment, gender discrimination, and age discrimination. Although Hurst's women often have jobs, economic security for women is typically portrayed as coming through marriage, or sometimes through being a well-paid mistress to a wealthy man. Women whose relationships fail to meet these standards, or who pursue a type of love relationship without economic benefits, suffer deprivation or meet with tragedy. The women's situations are frequently made worse by their own passivity, a trait Hurst deplored; a happy ending often either does not occur, or occurs because of outside forces rather than the afflicted woman's own efforts. Hurst also focused on describing the "interior lives of women" and how the life choices of her female characters are driven by feelings and passions that they often cannot articulate or explain.
        Influence and legacy [ edit ] Upon her death in 1968, Hurst left half of her estate to her alma mater, Washington University in St. Louis, and the other half to Brandeis University. The universities used the money to endow professorships in their respective English departments and to create "Hurst Lounges" for writers to share their work with academics and students.
        At the time of her death, and for several decades thereafter, Hurst was treated as a popular culture writer, credited with having "set the style followed by Jacqueline Susann, Judith Krantz, and Jackie Collins" and considered "one of the great trash novelists". Her works fell into obscurity and largely went out of print. In the 1990s, Hurst's life and work again started to receive serious critical attention, including the formation of a Fannie Hurst Society for interested scholars; a volume of literary criticism by Abe C. Ravitz published in 1997; and a detailed biography of Hurst by Kroeger published in 1999. In 2004, The Feminist Press published a collection of her stories from between the years 1912 and 1935, seeking to "propel a long overdue revival and reassessment of Hurst's work" and praising her "depth, intelligence, and artistry as a writer."
        Other aspects of Hurst's life and work examined by scholars include her American Jewish background, her friendship with and patronage of Zora Neale Hurston (which Hurston discussed in her own autobiography), the treatment of racial issues in her novel Imitation of Life and the movies based upon it, and even her well-publicized dieting. She has also been called a pioneer in the field of public relations due to her development of her own strong public persona.
        In popular culture [ edit ] Hurst was a huge advocate for women maintaining independence their whole lives, even after marriage. In the 1920s, after Hurst revealed her marriage to Jacques Danielson, yet retained her own name and each had their own separate homes, the term "a Fannie Hurst marriage" was coined to describe a marital arrangement similar to Hurst's, where the husband and wife each maintained their own independent lives, even to the point of living in separate residences.
        Hurst has been referenced in popular culture to exemplify a popular or lowbrow author, in contrast to serious, literary authors. The theme song of the 1970 Mel Brooks comedy film The Twelve Chairs includes the lines, "Hope for the best, expect the worst/ You could be Tolstoy or Fannie Hurst." Hurst is mentioned in a similar vein in the song "You're So London" by Mike Nichols and Ken Welch, written for the show Julie and Carol at Carnegie Hall (1962): "You're so kippers, you're so caviar and I'm so liverwurst/ You're so Shakespeare, so Bernard Shaw and I'm so Fannie Hurst."
        Selected works [ edit ] Short story collections [ edit ] Just Around the Corner (1914)Every Soul Hath Its Song (1916)Gaslight Sonatas (1918)Humoresque: A Laugh on Life with a Tear Behind It (1919)[22]The Vertical City (1922)Song of Life (1927)Procession (1929)We are Ten (1937)Novels [ edit ] Star-Dust: The Story of an American Girl (1921)Lummox (1923)Mannequin (1926)Appassionata (1926)A President is Born (1928)Five and Ten (1929)Back Street (1931)Imitation of Life (1933)Anitra's Dance (1934)Great Laughter (1936)Lonely Parade (1942)Hallelujah (1944)The Hands of Veronica (1947)Anywoman (1950)The Name is Mary (1951)The Man with One Head (1951)Family! (1960)God Must Be Sad (1961)Fool, Be Still (1964)Autobiography [ edit ] Anatomy of Me: A Wonderer in Search of Herself (1958)Other books [ edit ] No Food with My Meals (1935) (non-fiction autobiographical memoir about dieting)Today is Ladies' Day (1939) (Home Institute booklet, offered through newspapers)White Christmas (1942) (short fiction, Christmas story)Stage plays [ edit ] The Official Chaperon (1909) (produced at Washington University, St. Louis)[4][5]The Land of the Free (1917) (co-written with Harriet Ford)Back Pay (1921) (adaptation by Hurst of her 1919 short story of the same name)Humoresque (1923) (adaptation by Hurst of her 1918 short story of the same name)It Is To Laugh (1927) (adaptation by Hurst of her short story "The Gold in Fish" (1925))Four Daughters (1941) (story credit; stage play was adapted by Frank Vreeland from Hurst's short story "Sister Act")Film credits [ edit ] Humoresque (1920)Lummox (1930), based on 1923 novel; also dialogueSymphony of Six Million (1932), based on story "Night Bell"Back Street (1932), based on novelImitation of Life (1934), based on the novelBack Street (1941), based on novelHumoresque (1946), based on storyImitation of Life (1959), based on novelReferences [ edit ] ^ a b West, Kathryn (2004). "Fannie Hurst". In Wintz, Cary D. (ed.). Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance. 1: A-J. Finkelman, Paul. New York and Abingdon: Routledge. pp. 596''597. ISBN 1-57958-389-X . Retrieved June 21, 2010 . ^ O'Brian, Edward (1918). The best American short stories of 1917 and the yearbook of the American short story. BOSTON SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY PUBLISHERS . Retrieved 17 October 2015 . ^ Corbett, Katharine T. (1999). In Her Place: A Guide to St. Louis Women's History. St. Louis, MO: Missouri History Museum. ^ a b Untitled, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 30, 1909, image 8, column 5 ^ a b Marguerite Martyn, "Marguerite Martyn Discovers Real College Playwright in Fannie Hurst," St. Louis Post-Dispatch, June 17, 1909, image 13 ^ Brooke Kroeger, Fannie Hurst: The Talent for Success of Writer Fannie Hurst, 2013, location 272 ^ Frederick, A.(1980). HURST, Fannie, oct. 18, 1889-feb. 23, 1968.. In Notable American women: The modern period. Retrieved from Simmons College Library ^ a b c d Hurst, Fannie 1885Fl - 1968. (1999). In The Cambridge guide to women's writing in English. Retrieved from Simmons College Library ^ Hurst, Fannie, (1889 --1968). (2005). In The crystal reference encyclopedia. Retrieved from Simmons College Library ^ "This Side of Paradise". 1920. ^ "Complete National Film Registry Listing - National Film Preservation Board - Programs - Library of Congress" . Retrieved 3 August 2018 . ^ Many sources list the total number of her novels as 18, and omit The Name is Mary, which was published in 1951 by Dell as a romance paperback after its original 1946 publication in The American Magazine. ^ a b Bolick, Kate (March 4, 2005). "Hurst and Hurston". Tablet . Retrieved 2017-02-13 . ^ Green, David B. (October 18, 2013). "This Day in Jewish History A Storyteller With a Conscience Is Born". Haaretz . Retrieved 2017-02-13 . ^ "Hadassah Honors Denmark for Rescuing Jews from Nazi Invaders". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. December 17, 1963 . Retrieved 2017-02-13 . ^ "Yakety-Yak". TIME magazine. 1959-04-06 . Retrieved 2009-01-10 . ^ Tropiano, pp. 4''5 ^ Capsuto, Steven. "Kudos! AGLA's and GLAAD's Gay and Lesbian Media Awards". Archived from the original on 2008-08-19 . Retrieved 2009-01-10 . ^ Fannie Hurst. Anatomy of Me: A Wonderer in Search of Herself (p. 219). New York: Doubleday, 1958. ISBN 0-405-12843-6. ^ G­sli Plsson. Travelling Passions: The Hidden Life Of Vilhjalmur Stefansson (pp. 187, 195). Lebanon: University Press of New England, 2005. ISBN 1-58465-510-0. ^ Robert Shulman. Romany Marie: The Queen of Greenwich Village (p. 144). Louisville: Butler Books, 2006. ISBN 1-884532-74-8. ^ Hurst, Fannie (1920) [1919]. Humoresque: A Laugh on Life with a Tear Behind It. New York City: Harper & Brothers. Bibliography [ edit ] Tropiano, Stephen (2002). The Prime Time Closet: A History of Gays and Lesbians on TV . New York: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books. ISBN 1-55783-557-8. External links [ edit ]
      Carla Kaplan, author | Official website | Biography: About Carla Kaplan
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        HomeBiographyBooksNewsEventsContacts Biography: About Carla KaplanCarla Kaplan. Photo by Robin Hultgren. Download hi-resCarla Kaplan is the Davis Distinguished Professor of American Literature at Northeastern University, where, as the Founding Director of the university's Humanities Center, she created a conversational hub dedicated to diversity. She has held positions at Yale University, the University of Southern California, and the University of Illinois and also teaches writing through arts councils and writers' centers.
        Kaplan's previous books include Zora Neale Hurston: A Life in Letters, the first published collection of a major African American woman's letters. This melding of biography, cultural history, and correspondence drew on nearly fifty archives and was a finalist for the NAACP Image Award, a New York Times Notable Book, a New York magazine "top five" book of the season, a Book-of-the-Month Club pick, and the subject of feature articles in The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.
        She is also the author of The Erotics of Talk: Women's Writing and Feminist Paradigms and the editor of numerous works of African American literature, including Hurston's long-lost book of folklore, Every Tongue Got to Confess: Negro Folk-Tales From the Gulf States; Nella Larsen's Harlem Renaissance novels Passing and Quicksand, and a lost work of the black experience, Dark Symphony, by Elizabeth Laura Adams, as well as occasional pieces for such publications as The Los Angeles Times and The Nation. She lectures widely on literature and culture.
        Miss Anne in Harlem draws on Kaplan's thirty years as a white scholar in Black Studies to explore cultural crossovers. Her next book, a biography of Jessica Mitford, the rebellious daughter of eccentric British peers'--a woman with a wicked sense of humor who gave up wealth and privilege to become an American activist and, eventually, one of the most important American muckrakers of the twentieth century'--will also be published by HarperCollins.
        Kaplan has received such academic honors as the Robert D. Klein Award, the Mary L. Cornille Distinguished Visiting Professorship at Wellesley College, the Fannie Hurst Professorship at Washington University, and others, as well as fellowships from The John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the New York Public Library's Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Culture, the NEH, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, the National Humanities Center, the Harry Ransom Center, the Beinecke Library, and elsewhere. In May 2014, on the basis of Miss Anne in Harlem, Carla was elected a Fellow of the Society of American Historians.
        Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, Kaplan grew up in Evanston, Illinois, spending summers in Cape Cod and going to camp at Circle Pines Center, one of the nation's first interracial cooperatives; she lives in Boston and Wellfleet, Massachusetts.
        Praise for Miss Anne in Harlem"An empathetic and skillful writer, Kaplan ... shares the previously untold story of a group of notable white women who embraced black culture'--and life'--in Harlem in the 1920s and '30s. ... Captivating."
        '-- Publishers Weekly (starred review)
        "Kaplan always writes from inside her characters, and with a novelist's sense of scope'--and compassion."
        '-- Hilton Als for The New Yorker
        "Kaplan's meticulously documented and intrepid history of Miss Anne encompasses a unique vantage on the complexities of race and gender and a dramatic study in paradox."
        '-- Donna Seaman for BookList
        "The fact that white women played a pivotal role in creating the Harlem Renaissance was a secret hiding in plain sight, but it took Carla Kaplan's keen eye, rigorous research, and crystal clear prose to reveal it. Miss Anne in Harlem is a surprising, delightful book, that will soon be essential reading for anyone interested in the Harlem Renaissance and the brave, bold women of the Jazz Age."
        '-- Debby Applegate, author of The Most Famous Man in America
        "With superb, exhaustive research and finely dramatic writing, Carla Kaplan's brilliant Miss Anne in Harlem fills an aching void in our knowledge of the Harlem Renaissance. It also significantly deepens our understanding of American culture in the 1920s and American feminism in general."
        '-- Arnold Rampersad, author of The Life of Langston Hughes
        "A work of meticulous and far-ranging scholarship, Carla Kaplan's Miss Anne in Harlem [assembles] an unforgettable cast of race-rebels, 'traitors to whiteness,' who gave their full resources'--talent, compassion, money, ingenuity'--to the cause of black cultural liberation a half-century before America discovered that 'black is beautiful.' A story of Harlem Renaissance insiders who would always be outsiders, Kaplan's haunting narrative forces a rethinking of race and gender."
        '-- Megan Marshall, author of Margaret Fuller: A New American Life and The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism
        "Carla Kaplan has taken on a dauntingly liminal topic and by force of scholarly rigor and narrative compassion rendered it central to our understanding of an era. Lush, original, and vigorously argued, Miss Anne in Harlem does justice to the difficult richness not only of these exceptional women's lives but of life itself."
        '-- Diane McWhorter, author of Carry Me Home
        "Endlessly fascinating, Miss Anne in Harlem reveals a whole new perspective on the Harlem Renaissance, and Carla Kaplan delivers an essential and absorbing portrait of race and sex in 20th century America."
        '-- Gilbert King, author of Devil in the Grove
        "In this utterly fascinating and deeply insightful account, Carla Kaplan reveals the disparate women who together became "Miss Anne" in the Harlem Renaissance. From the reticent Annie Nathan Meyer through the manipulative Charlotte Osgood Mason to the flamboyant Nancy Cunard, they could see themselves as better Negroes than actual black people and despise other whites in black milieu. Yet they challenged the meanings of race and gender in ways that still deserve attention. This fine book takes the Misses Anne seriously and goes further, to reveal the workings of interracial networks in one of the most important cultural phenomena in American history."
        '-- Nell Irvin Painter, author of The History of White People
        Share your own "Miss Anne" story Buy the book Amazon.comBarnes & NobleBooks-a-MillionIndieBound (Your local bookstore)Powell's
      Miss Ann - Wikipedia
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        Miss Ann is an expression used inside the African-American community to refer to a European-American woman (or sometimes a black woman) who is arrogant and condescending in her attitude.
        The characteristics associated with someone called a "Miss Ann" include being considered "uppity", or in the case of a black woman, "acting white".[1]
        Like the male counterpart term, Mister Charlie, the term Miss Ann was once common among many African-Americans. It was a pejorative way of commenting on imperious behaviour from white women, particularly when it came with racist undertones. It is seldom used among young African-Americans today, instead the term ''Karen'' has come into further usage amongst people of all races in the United States.[2]
        In popular culture [ edit ] Miss Anne: ''A White Woman'''--Zora Neale Hurston, Glossary of Harlem Slang
        Ann; Miss Ann: Coded term for any white female. [i.e.] ''His mama washes clothes on Wednesday for Miss Ann.'''--Clarence Major, From Juba to Jive: A Dictionary of African-American Slang
        Ann: (1) A derisive term for a white woman '... Also ''Miss Ann.'''--Geneva Smitherman, Black Talk
        Miss Ann and Mister Eddie: Emancipated bluebloods.'--Taylor Gordon, Born to Be
        "I'd remind them please, look at those knees, you got at Miss Ann's scrubbing."''Maya Angelou, Sepia Fashion Show[3]
        "Oh, oh, oh, Miss Ann, you're doing something no one can'..."''"Miss Ann" song by Little Richard. Here the singer may be referring to the white woman, Ann Johnson, who mothered him as a young teenager, twisting the standard connotation in ambiguous ways.[4]
        See also [ edit ] House NegroMister CharlieUncle TomKaren (pejorative)References [ edit ]
      Conspicuous consumption - Wikipedia
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 15:57
        Concept in sociology and economy
        Conspicuous consumption is a term used to describe and explain the consumer practice of purchasing or using goods of a higher quality or in greater quantity than might be considered necessary in practical terms.[1] More specifically, it refers to the spending of money on or the acquiring of luxury goods and services in order to publically (i.e., conspicuously) display the economic power of one's income or accumulated wealth. To the conspicuous consumer, such a public display of discretionary economic power is a means of either attaining or maintaining a given social status.[2][3]
        The term was coined by Thorstein Veblen. The development of Veblen's sociology of conspicuous consumption has since produced the terms invidious consumption, the ostentatious consumption of goods to provoke the envy of other people; and conspicuous compassion, the deliberate use of charitable donations of money to enhance the social prestige of the donor with a display of superior socio-economic status.[4]
        The concept of consumerism stems from conspicuous consumption.[5]
        History and development [ edit ] The economist and sociologist Thorstein Veblen (1857''1929) introduced the term "conspicuous consumption" in 1899 in his book The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study in the Evolution of Institutions. Veblen described the behavioural characteristics of the nouveau riche ('new rich') social class which emerged as a result of capital accumulation during the Second Industrial Revolution (c. 1860''1914).[6] In that 19th-century social and historical context, the term "conspicuous consumption" applied narrowly in association with the men, women, and families of the upper class who applied their great wealth as a means of publicly manifesting their social power and prestige, either real or perceived.
        According to Veblen, the strength of one's reputation is in direct relationship to the amount of money possessed and displayed; that is to say, the basis "of gaining and retaining a good name, are leisure and conspicuous consumption."[7]
        Veblen's theory was criticized by writer H. L. Mencken:[8]
        Do I enjoy a decent bath because I know that John Smith cannot afford one - or because I delight in being clean? Do I admire Beethoven's Fifth Symphony because it is incomprehensible to Congressmen and Methodists - or because I genuinely love music? Do I prefer terrapin la Maryland to fried liver because plowhands must put up with the liver - or because the terrapin is intrinsically a more charming dose? Do I prefer kissing a pretty girl to kissing a charwoman because even a janitor may kiss a charwoman - or because the pretty girl looks better, smells better and kisses better?
        In the 20th century, the significant improvement of the material standard-of-living of societies and the consequent growth of the middle class saw the term "conspicuous consumption" broadened to apply to the men, women, and households who possessed the discretionary income that allowed them to practice the patterns of economic consumption'--of goods and services'--which were motivated by the desire for prestige, the public display of social status, rather than by the intrinsic, practical utility of the goods and the services proper.
        In the 1920s, economists such as Paul Nystrom (1878''1969) proposed that changes in lifestyle as result of the industrial age led to massive expansion of the "pecuniary emulation."[9] In other words, it had induced in the mass of society a "philosophy of futility" that would increase the consumption of goods and services as a social fashion'--i.e., an activity done for its own sake. In that context, commentators discuss "conspicuous consumption" either as a behavioural addiction or as a narcissistic behaviour, or as both, emphasising the psychological conditions induced by consumerism'--the desire for the immediate gratification of hedonic expectations.[citation needed ]
        Adapting Vablen's work, James Duesenberry in 1949 proposed what he described as the "demonstration" or "bandwagon" effect. According to Duesenberry's theory, a person's conspicuous consumption psychologically depends not only upon the actual level of spending, but also depends upon the degree of his or her spending, as compared with and to the spending of other people. That the conspicuous consumer is motivated by the importance, to him or to her, of the opinion of the social and economic reference groups for whom are performed the patterns of conspicuous consumption.[10][11]
        Recent development [ edit ] Under Veblen's theory, conspicuous consumption was theorized to comprise socio-economic behaviours practiced by high wealth or high-income people; as something exclusively for the rich.[9] However, more recent economic research indicated that conspicuous consumption is in fact less common among the affluent and more common among lower-income groups, regardless of racial or ethnic background, and also common to the societies of countries with emerging economies: "It signals that the owner came from a poor group and has something to prove."[12]
        In The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America's Wealthy (1996), Thomas J. Stanley and William D. Danko reported that Americans with a net worth of more than $1-million are likely to avoid conspicuous consumption, and that millionaires tend to practice frugality'--for example, preferring to buy used cars with cash rather than new cars with credit, in order to avoid material depreciation and paying interest for a loan to buy a new car.[13]
        Consumerism theory [ edit ] The concept of consumerism has been derived from conspicuous consumption. As proposed by Thorstein Veblen in the 19th century, conspicuous consumption explains the psychological mechanics of a consumer society, and the increase in the number and the types of the goods and services that people consider necessary to and for their lives in a developed economy.
        Supporting interpretations and explanations of contemporary conspicuous consumption are presented in Consumer Culture (1996) by Celia Lury,[14] Consumer Culture and Modernity (1997) by Don Slater,[15] Symbolic Exchange and Death (1998) by Jean Baudrillard,[16] and Spent: Sex, Evolution, and the Secrets of Consumerism (2009) by Geoffrey Miller.[17] Moreover, D. Hebdige, in Hiding in the Light (1994), proposes that conspicuous consumption is a form of displaying a personal identity,[15][18][19] and a consequent function of advertising, as proposed in Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture (2000), by A. A. Berger.[20]
        Each variant interpretation and complementary explanation is derived from Veblen's original sociologic proposition in The Theory of the Leisure Class: that conspicuous consumption is a psychological end in itself, from which the practitioner (man, woman, family) derived the honour of superior social status.
        Materialism and gender [ edit ] A 2013 study by academics Brenda Segal and Jeffrey S. Podoshen found significant differences between the male and female genders relating to conspicuous consumption, materialism, and impulse buying.[21] The study analysed survey data from 1,180 Americans. The results showed that men scored higher for both materialism and conspicuous consumption. The study also suggested that women were more likely to impulse buy. However, no noteworthy differences were found relating to brand loyalty.[21]
        Distinctions of type [ edit ] The term conspicuous consumption denotes the act of buying many things, especially expensive things, that are not necessary to one's life, done in a way that makes people notice the buyer's having bought the merchandise.[22] Scholar Andrew Trigg (2001) defined conspicuous consumption as the behaviours whereby a man or a woman can display great wealth, by means of idleness'--expending much time in the practice of leisure activities, and spending much money to consume luxury goods and services.[23]
        Conspicuous compassion, the practice of publicly donating large sums of money to charity to enhance the social prestige of the donor, is sometimes described as a type of conspicuous consumption.[4] This behaviour has long been recognised and sometimes attacked'--for example, the New Testament story Lesson of the widow's mite criticises wealthy people who make large donations ostentatiously while praising poorer people who make small but comparatively more difficult donations in private.[24]
        Conspicuous consumption can take form for various reasons, including:
        Demonstration/bandwagon effect '-- In the book Income, Saving and the Theory of Consumer Behavior (1949), James Duesenberry proposed that a person's conspicuous consumption psychologically depends not only upon the actual level of spending, but also depends upon the degree of his or her spending, as compared with and to the spending of other people. That the conspicuous consumer is motivated by the importance, to him or to her, of the opinion of the social and economic reference groups for whom are performed the patterns of conspicuous consumption.[10][11]Aggressive ostentation '-- In a 2006 CBSNews.com article, Dick Meyer said that conspicuous consumption is a form of anger towards society, an "aggressive ostentation" that is an antisocial behaviour, which arose from the social alienation suffered by men, women, and families who feel they have become anonymous in and to their societies. This feeling of alienation is aggravated by the decay of the communitarian ethic essential to a person feeling him or herself part of the whole society.[8]Shelter and transport '-- In the United States, the trend towards building houses that were larger-than-needed, by a nuclear family, began in the 1950s. Decades later, in the year 2000, that practice of conspicuous consumption resulted in people buying houses that were double the average size needed to comfortably house a nuclear family.[25] The negative consequences of either buying or building an oversized house was either the loss of or the reduction of the family's domestic recreational space'--the backyard and the front yard; the spending of old-age retirement funds to pay for a too-big house; and over-long commuting time, from house to job, and vice versa, because the required plot of land was unavailable near a city. Oversized houses facilitated other forms of conspicuous consumption, such as an oversized garage for the family's oversized motor vehicles or buying more clothing to fill larger clothes closets. Conspicuous consumption becomes a self-generating cycle of spending money for the sake of social prestige. Analogous to the consumer trend for oversized houses is the trend towards buying oversized light-trucks, specifically the off-road sport-utility-vehicle type (cf. station wagon/estate car), as a form of psychologically comforting conspicuous consumption, because such big motor-vehicles usually are bought by people who reside in a city, an urban nuclear family.[25]Prestige '' In a 1999 article, Jacqueline Eastman, Ronald Goldsmith, and Leisa Reinecke Flynn said that status consumption is based upon conspicuous consumption; however, the literature of contemporary marketing does not establish definitive meanings for the terms status consumption and conspicuous consumption.[26][27] Moreover, A. O'Cass and H. Frost (2002) claim that sociologists often incorrectly used the two terms as interchangeable and equivalent terms. In a later study, O'Cass and Frost determined that, as sociological constructs, the terms status consumption and conspicuous consumption denote different sociological behaviours.[28] About the ambiguities of denotation and connotation of the term conspicuous consumption, R. Mason (1984) reported that the classical, general theories of consumer decision-processes do not readily accommodate the construct of "conspicuous consumption," because the nature of said socio-economic behaviours varies according to the social class and the economic group studied.[29]Motivations '-- Paurav Shukla (2010) says that, whilst marketing and sales researchers recognise the importance of the buyer's social and psychological environment'--the definition of the term status-directed consumption remains ambiguous, because, to develop a comprehensive general theory requires that social scientists accept two fundamental assumptions, which usually do not concord. First, though the "rational" (economic) and the "irrational" (psychologic) elements of consumer decision-making often influence a person's decision to buy particular goods and services, marketing and sales researchers usually consider the rational element dominant in a person's decision to buy the particular goods and services. Second, the consumer perceives the utility of the product (the goods, the services) as a prime consideration in evaluating its usefulness, i.e. the reason to buy the product.[30] These assumptions, required for the development of a general theory of brand selection and brand purchase, are problematic, because the resultant theories tend either to misunderstand or to ignore the "irrational" element in the behaviour of the buyer-as-consumer; and because conspicuous consumption is a behaviour predominantly "psychological" in motivation and expression, Therefore, a comprehensive, general theory of conspicuous consumption would require a separate construct for the psychological (irrational) elements of the socio-economic phenomenon that is conspicuous consumption.Examples [ edit ] Conspicuous consumption is exemplified by purchasing goods that are exclusively designed to serve as symbols of wealth, such as luxury-brand clothing, high-tech tools, and vehicles.[5]
        Technology [ edit ] Many technological devices have been marketed as luxury products while essentially offering the same core features as the more basic models. Whilst it could be argued that these devices are the best available on the market, less expensive versions of the same product exist. Acquiring such products draws attention to the owners extravagant purchase and creates conversation about the procurement of the item. An example of such a purchase is the sale of Paul Newman's Rolex Daytona, which sold for US$17.75 million in New York on October 26, 2017.[31]
        Luxury fashion [ edit ] Materialistic consumers are likely to engage in conspicuous luxury consumption.[32] The global yearly revenue of the luxury fashion industry was '‚¬1.64 trillion in 2019.[33] Buying of conspicuous goods is likely to be influenced by the spending habits of others. This view of luxury conspicuous consumption is being incorporated into social media platforms which is impacting consumer behaviour.[32]
        Criticism [ edit ] High levels of conspicuous consumption may be seen as socially undesirable on two grounds; firstly, as it is often associated with high relative income, high levels of conspicuous consumption may be an indicator of high levels of income inequality, which may be found intrinsically or instrumentally objectionable; secondly conspicuous consumption differs from other forms of consumption in that the main reason for the purchase of positional goods is not due to the additional direct utility provided by the good's alleged high quality, but rather the social prestige associated with the consumption of that good. One downside of this search for status is that individual purchases of positional goods may at a social level be self-defeating due to external effects. In this case, the externality is status anxiety, the loss of social status suffered by people whose stock of high-status goods (positional goods) is diminished, in relation to the stocks of other conspicuous consumers, as they increase their consumption of high-status goods and services; effectively, status-seeking is a zero-sum game'--by definition, the rise of one person in the social hierarchy can occur only at the expense of other people. Therefore, the conspicuous consumption of luxury goods and services (positional goods) is an economic loss'--like competitive military spending (an arms race), wherein each country must match the military expenditures of other countries in the arms race, or suffer a loss of relative military power.
        Veblen's theory was criticized early on by writer H. L. Mencken:[8]
        Do I enjoy a decent bath because I know that John Smith cannot afford one - or because I delight in being clean? Do I admire Beethoven's Fifth Symphony because it is incomprehensible to Congressmen and Methodists - or because I genuinely love music? Do I prefer terrapin la Maryland to fried liver because plowhands must put up with the liver - or because the terrapin is intrinsically a more charming dose? Do I prefer kissing a pretty girl to kissing a charwoman because even a janitor may kiss a charwoman - or because the pretty girl looks better, smells better and kisses better?
        Inequality and debt [ edit ] A paper on ''Inequality, Debt, and Conspicuous Consumption'' by Sheheryar Banuri and Ha Nguyen (2020), reported three main findings:[34]
        Consumption tends to increase when it is conspicuous: signals status and is observable by other.When consumption is conspicuous borrowing increases: loans are taken out by individuals lower on the income distribution.Access to finance worsens inequality: poorer individuals borrow to signal status, and loan-taking may further increase inequality.These findings show the cyclical effect of costly borrowing and inequality. Lower socioeconomic groups try to match the consumption patterns of those who are wealthier with the main objective of increasing status. Due to access to credit and inequality, personal finance decisions motivated by conspicuous consumption may generate inadvertent macroeconomic volatility. If the distorted personal financial decisions disproportionately affect the poor, inequality could worsen. This study showed evidence supportive of pecuniary emulation and cautioned the use of finance to increase one's social standing.[34] As said by Veblen ''Among the motives which lead men to accumulate wealth, the primacy, both in scope and intensity, therefore, continues to belong to this motive of pecuniary emulation'' (Veblen, 1899, pg. 27).[2]
        Solutions [ edit ] In the case of conspicuous consumption, taxes upon luxury goods diminish societal expenditures on high-status goods, by rendering them more expensive than non-positional goods. In this sense, luxury taxes can be seen as a market failure correcting Pigovian tax'--with an apparent negative deadweight loss, these taxes are a more efficient mechanism for increasing revenue than 'distorting' labour or capital taxes.[35] A luxury tax applied to goods and services for conspicuous consumption is a type of progressive sales tax that at least partially corrects the negative externality associated with the conspicuous consumption of positional goods.[36] In Utility from Accumulation (2009), Louis Kaplow said that assets exercise an objective social-utility function, i.e. the rich man and the rich woman hoard material assets, because the hoard, itself, functions as status goods that establish his and her socio-economic position within society.[37] When utility is derived directly from accumulation of assets, this lowers the dead weight loss associated with inheritance taxes and raises the optimal rate of inheritance taxation.[38]
        In the 19th century, the philosopher John Stuart Mill recommended taxing the practice of conspicuous consumption.
        In place of luxury taxes, economist Robert H. Frank proposed the application of a progressive consumption tax; in a 1998 New York Times article, John Tierney said that as a remedy for the social and psychological malaise that is conspicuous consumption, the personal income tax should be replaced with a progressive tax upon the yearly sum of discretionary income spent on the conspicuous consumption of goods and services.[39] Another option is the redistribution of wealth, either by means of an incomes policy '' for example the conscious efforts to promote wage compression under variants of social corporatism such as the Rehn''Meidner model and/or by some mix of progressive taxation and transfer policies, and provision of public goods. When individuals are concerned with their relative income or consumption in comparison to their peers, the optimal degree of public good provision and of progression of the tax system is raised.[40][41][42] Because the activity of conspicuous consumption, itself, is a form of superior good, diminishing the income inequality of the income distribution by way of an egalitarian policy reduces the conspicuous consumption of positional goods and services. In Wealth and Welfare (1912), the economist A. C. Pigou said that the redistribution of wealth might lead to great gains in social welfare:
        Now the part played by comparative, as distinguished from absolute, income is likely to be small for incomes that only suffice to provide the necessaries and primary comforts of life, but to be large with large incomes. In other words, a larger proportion of the satisfaction yielded by the incomes of rich people comes from their relative, rather than from their absolute, amount. This part of it will not be destroyed if the incomes of all rich people are diminished together. The loss of economic welfare suffered by the rich when command over resources is transferred from them to the poor will, therefore, be substantially smaller relatively to the gain of economic welfare to the poor than a consideration of the law of diminishing utility taken by itself suggests.[43]
        The economic case for the taxation of positional, luxury goods has a long history; in the mid-19th century, in Principles of Political Economy with some of their Applications to Social Philosophy (1848), John Stuart Mill said:
        I disclaim all asceticism, and by no means wish to see discouraged, either by law or opinion, any indulgence which is sought from a genuine inclination for, any enjoyment of, the thing itself; but a great portion of the expenses of the higher and middle classes in most countries ... is not incurred for the sake of the pleasure afforded by the things on which the money is spent, but from regard to opinion, and an idea that certain expenses are expected from them, as an appendage of station; and I cannot but think that expenditure of this sort is a most desirable subject of taxation. If taxation discourages it, some good is done, and if not, no harm; for in so far as taxes are levied on things which are desired and possessed from motives of this description, nobody is the worse for them. When a thing is bought not for its use but for its costliness, cheapness is no recommendation.[44]
        "Conspicuous non consumption" is a phrase used to describe a conscious choice to opt out of consumption with the intention of sending deliberate social signals.[45][46]
        See also [ edit ] References [ edit ] ^ Phillips, Ronnie J. 2014 April 22. "Conspicuous consumption." Encyclopedia Britannica. ^ a b Veblen, Thorstein (1899). The Theory of the Leisure Class. Project Gutenberg. ^ The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought, Third Edition, Alan Bullock, Stephen Trombley, Eds., 1993, p. 162. ^ a b West, Patrick (2004). Conspicuous Compassion: Why Sometimes It Really Is Cruel To Be Kind. London: Civitas, Institute for the Study of Civil Society. ISBN 978-1-903386-34-7. ^ a b Kenton, Will. "Conspicuous Consumption". Investopedia . Retrieved 2021-05-10 . ^ Veblen, Thorstein. (1899) Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study in the Evolution of Institutions. New York: Macmillan. (ISBN 0-486-28062-4, 1994 Dover pbk ed.; ISBN 0-14-018795-2, 1994 Penguin Classics ed.). ^ Veblen, Thorstein (1912), The Theory of the Leisure Class. New York: Macmillan Company. p. 4. ^ a b c Meyer, Dick (2009-02-11). "Aggressive Ostentation". CBS News . Retrieved 2021-05-10 . ^ a b "Conspicuous Consumption '' The Term, The Book, Examples" . Retrieved 2021-05-10 . ^ a b Duesenberry, James S. (1949), Income, Saving and the Theory of Consumer Behavior. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ^ a b Shukla, Paurav (2008). "Conspicuous consumption among middle age consumers: Psychological and brand antecedents". Journal of Product & Brand Management. 17: 25''36. doi:10.1108/10610420810856495. ^ Postrel, Virginia. 2008 July/August. "Inconspicuous Consumption." The Atlantic. "Conspicuous consumption, this research suggests, is not an unambiguous signal of personal affluence. It's a sign of belonging to a relatively poor group." ^ Stanley, Thomas J.; Danko, William D. (1998). The Millionaire Next Door. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 9780671015206. ^ Lury, Celia (1996). Consumer Culture . Polity Press. ISBN 9780745614410. ^ a b Slater, Don. (1997) Consumer Culture and Modernity. London: Polity. ^ Baudrillard, J. (1998b) Symbolic Exchange and Death. London: Sage. ^ Miller G, Spent: sex, evolution and the secrets of consumerism, Random House, London, 2009 (ISBN 9780670020621) ^ Hebdige, D. (1994) Hiding in the Light. London: Routledge. ^ Wilson, E. (ed.) Chic Thrills. A Fashion Reader. London: HarperCollins ^ Berger, A. A. (2000) Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield. ^ a b Segal, Brenda; Podoshen, Jeffrey S. (March 2013). "An examination of materialism, conspicuous consumption and gender differences: Materialism, conspicuous consumption and gender differences". International Journal of Consumer Studies. 37 (2): 189''198. doi:10.1111/j.1470-6431.2012.01099.x. ^ Longman American Dictionary, 2000, p. 296. ^ Trigg, A. (2001). "Veblen, Bourdieu, and conspicuous consumption". Journal of Economic Issues. 35 (1): 99''115. doi:10.1080/00213624.2001.11506342. JSTOR 4227638. S2CID 55731706. ^ Robert L. Payton and Michael P. Moody (2008). Understanding Philanthropy: Its Meaning and Mission. p. 137. ISBN 978-0253000132. ^ a b Lloyd, Carol (2005-10-14). "Monster Homes R Us: American homes are monuments to conspicuous consumption". SF Chronicle . Retrieved 2011-10-20 . ^ Eastman, Jacqueline K., Ronald Goldsmith, and Leisa Reinecke Flynn (1999). "Status Consumption in Consumer Behaviour: Scale Development and Validation". Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice. 7 (3): 41''51. doi:10.1080/10696679.1999.11501839. CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) ^ Shukla, Paurav (2010-01-09). "Status (luxury) consumption among British and Indian consumers". Paurav Shukla (Podcast). International Marketing Review . Retrieved 2011-10-20 . ^ O'Cass, A.; Frost, H. (2002). "Status Brands: Examining the Effects of Non-product-related Brand Associations on Status and Conspicuous Consumption". Journal of Product & Brand Management. 11 (2): 67''88. doi:10.1108/10610420210423455. ^ Mason, R. (1984). "Conspicuous Consumption: A Literature Review". European Journal of Marketing. 18 (3): 26''39. doi:10.1108/eum0000000004779. ^ Shukla, P. (2010). "Status Consumption in Cross-national Context: Socio-psychological, Brand and Situational Antecedents". International Marketing Review. 27 (1): 108''129. doi:10.1108/02651331011020429. ^ a b https://www.forbes.com/sites/hylabauer/2017/10/26/paul-newmans-paul-newman-daytona-sells-for-15-5-million-a-record-for-a-wristwatch-at-auction/?sh=77570abf5313 ^ a b Charoennan, Wanwisa; Huang, Kai-Ping (2018). "THE ANTECEDENTS AND CONSEQUENCES OF CONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION OF LUXURY FASHION GOODS IN A SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM". International Journal of Organizational Innovation. 11: 1''21. ^ Cabigiosu, Anna (2020), "An Overview of the Luxury Fashion Industry", Digitalization in the Luxury Fashion Industry, Palgrave Advances in Luxury, Cham: Springer International Publishing: 9''31, doi:10.1007/978-3-030-48810-9_2, ISBN 978-3-030-48809-3, PMC 7355146 ^ a b Sheheryar, Banuri; Ha, Nguyen (2020). "Borrowing to Keep Up (with the Joneses): Inequality, Debt, and Conspicuous Consumption". Policy Research Working Paper '' via World Bank Group. ^ Ng, Yew-Kwang (1987). "Diamonds Are a Government's Best Friend: Burden-Free Taxes on Goods Valued for Their Values". American Economic Review. 77 (1): 186''191. JSTOR 1806737. ^ Smano, Daniel (2009). "Optimal Linear Taxation of Positional Goods" (PDF) . Working Paper. University of Minnesota. ^ Kaplow, L. (2009). "Utility from Accumulation". doi:10.3386/w15595 . ^ Cremer, H.; Pestieau, P. (2011). "The Tax Treatment of Intergenerational Wealth Transfers" (PDF) . CESifo Economic Studies. 57 (2): 365''401. doi:10.1093/cesifo/ifr014. ^ Tierney, John (1998-11-30). "The Big City; Rich and Poor, Consumed By Consuming". The New York Times . Retrieved 2011-10-20 . ^ Micheletto, L. (2011). "Optimal Nonlinear Redistributive Taxation and Public Good Provision in an Economy with Veblen Effects". Journal of Public Economic Theory. 13 (1): 71''96. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9779.2010.01493.x. ^ Boskin, Michael J.; Sheshinski, Eytan (1978). "Optimal Redistributive Taxation When Individual Welfare Depends Upon Relative Income". Quarterly Journal of Economics. 92 (4): 589''601. doi:10.2307/1883177. JSTOR 1883177. ^ Aronsson, Thomas; Johansson-Stenman, Olof (2008). "When the Joneses' Consumption Hurts: Optimal Public Good Provision and Nonlinear Income Taxation". Journal of Public Economics. 92 (5''6): 986''997. doi:10.1016/j.jpubeco.2007.12.007. ^ Pigou, Arthur Cecil (1912). Wealth and Welfare. ^ John Stuart Mill, Principles of Political Economy with some of their Applications to Social Philosophy, book 5, ch. 6, pt. 7 (W. J. Ashley, ed., Longmans, Green & Co. 1909) (1848) ^ S¸rensen, Elin Brandi; Hjalager, Anne-Mette (19 December 2019). "Conspicuous non-consumption in tourism: Non-innovation or the innovation of nothing?" (PDF) . Tourist Studies. 20 (2): 222''247. doi:10.1177/1468797619894463. S2CID 213042469. ^ Portwood-Stacer, Laura (5 December 2012). "Media refusal and conspicuous non-consumption: The performative and political dimensions of Facebook abstention". New Media & Society. 15 (7): 1041''1057. doi:10.1177/1461444812465139. S2CID 40206877. Further reading [ edit ] Thorstein Veblen (1899). Theory of the Leisure Class at Project Gutenberg Thorstein Veblen: Conspicuous Consumption, 1902 at Fordham University's "Modern History Sourcebook"The Good Life: An International Perspective, a short article by Amitai Etzioni
      Margaret Avery - Wikipedia
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        American actress
        Margaret Avery
        Born ( 1944-04-15 ) April 15, 1944 (age 77) OccupationActress, singerYears active1972''present Spouse(s) Robert Gordon Hunt
        '‹
        '‹
        (
        m. 1974;
        div. 1980)
        '‹
        Children1Margaret Avery (born April 15, 1944) is an American actress and singer. She began her career appearing on stage and later had starring roles in films including Cool Breeze (1972), Which Way Is Up? (1977), Scott Joplin (1977), and The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh (1979).
        Avery is best known for her performance as Shug Avery in the 1985 period drama film The Color Purple for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.[1] She continued appearing in films including Blueberry Hill (1988), White Man's Burden (1995), Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins (2008), Meet the Browns (2008), and Proud Mary (2018). In 2013, Avery began starring as Helen Patterson, lead character's mother, in the BET drama series Being Mary Jane.
        Early life [ edit ] Margaret Avery was born in Mangum, Oklahoma and raised in San Diego, California, where she attended Point Loma High School.[2] She then attended San Francisco State University where, in 1965, she earned a degree in education.[3] While working as a substitute teacher in Los Angeles, Avery began making singing and acting appearances.[2]
        Career [ edit ] Avery is best known for her role as Shug Avery in the 1985 film The Color Purple. Her performance in this screen adaptation of Alice Walker's prize-winning novel The Color Purple earned Avery an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress.
        Among the plays Avery appeared in were Revolution and The Sistuhs. In 1972, she received the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Performance by an Actress for her performance in Does a Tiger Wear a Necktie?.[4][5]
        In the television movie Something Evil (1972), a horror story with Sandy Dennis and Darren McGavin, Avery was directed by Steven Spielberg. That same year she made her theatrical motion picture debut as Lark in the crime film Cool Breeze with Thalmus Rasulala and Judy Pace. In this blaxploitation remake of The Asphalt Jungle, Avery played the Marilyn Monroe part. The following year she played a prostitute in Magnum Force, the second in the series of Dirty Harry films starring Clint Eastwood, in which her character was murdered by her pimp. The character was killed through the pouring drain cleaner down the victim's throat which was said to have inspired the notorious Hi-Fi Murders case in 1974.[6][7]
        In the 1977 film Which Way Is Up?, directed by Michael Schultz, Avery gave a comedic performance as Annie Mae, the wife of Richard Pryor's character. That same year, she played Belle Joplin, wife of the ragtime composer Scott Joplin, opposite Billy Dee Williams in the title role.
        In 1992, Avery starred in The Jacksons: An American Dream as Martha Scruse, mother of Katherine Jackson, who was played by Angela Bassett.
        She has also made guest appearances on TV, including The New Dick Van Dyke Show, Kojak, Sanford and Son, Kolchak: The Night Stalker, A.E.S. Hudson Street, Murder, She Wrote, Miami Vice, Spenser: For Hire, The Cosby Show, Walker, Texas Ranger, and JAG.
        In 2008, Avery played Mama Jenkins in Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins, opposite Martin Lawrence and James Earl Jones, and Sarah Brown in Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns, which also stars Angela Bassett.
        Currently, Avery plays recurring character Helen Patterson in BET's series Being Mary Jane.[8]
        Personal life [ edit ] In January 1974, Margaret Avery married Robert Gordon Hunt. They have one daughter, Aisha Hunt, and divorced in 1980.[2]
        Margaret Avery lives in Los Angeles, and remains active in the show business. While continuing to act, she also works with at-risk teenagers and battered women of the Greater Los Angeles Area. She was interviewed by Melody Trice on The Melody Trice Show about her activism.[9]
        Filmography [ edit ] Film [ edit ] Television [ edit ] References [ edit ] ^ "Actress Gains Visibility, Respect With 'Purple ' ". Sun Sentinel . Retrieved 2010-12-04 . ^ a b c Brumburgh, Gary. "IMDb Mini Biography". ^ "Celebrate SF State and its extraordinary alumni". San Francisco State University. September 2014. ^ O'Donnell, Owen; Steen, Sara (1990). Contemporary Theatre, Film and Television. 8. Gale. p. 27. ISBN 9780810320710. ^ Los Angeles Times, March 20, 1974, "27 Win Critics' Circle Honors," p. E 1. ^ Kinder, Gary (1982). Victim: The Other Side of Murder. Delacorte Press. ISBN 0385291051. ^ Douglas, John E., and Olshaker, Mark (1999). The Anatomy of Motive: The FBI's Legendary Mindhunter Explores the Key to Understanding and Catching Violent Criminals . New York: Scribner. pp. 91''109. ISBN 978-0-684-84598-2. CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) ^ "Being Mary Jane". IMDB. ^ Roku. "Roku". Roku . Retrieved 2018-07-31 . ^ N'Duka, Amanda (5 April 2017). "Margaret Avery, Xander Berkeley & More Join Taraji P. Henson In 'Proud Mary ' " . Retrieved 9 July 2017 . External links [ edit ] Margaret Avery at IMDbMargaret Avery at AllMovie
      Ishtar | Goddess, Worship, & Facts | Britannica
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        Ishtar, (Akkadian), Sumerian Inanna, in Mesopotamian religion, goddess of war and sexual love. Ishtar is the Akkadian counterpart of the West Semitic goddess Astarte. Inanna, an important goddess in the Sumerian pantheon, came to be identified with Ishtar, but it is uncertain whether Inanna is also of Semitic origin or whether, as is more likely, her similarity to Ishtar caused the two to be identified. In the figure of Inanna several traditions seem to have been combined: she is sometimes the daughter of the sky god An, sometimes his wife; in other myths she is the daughter of Nanna, god of the moon, or of the wind god, Enlil. In her earliest manifestations she was associated with the storehouse and thus personified as the goddess of dates, wool, meat, and grain; the storehouse gates were her emblem. She was also the goddess of rain and thunderstorms'--leading to her association with An, the sky god'--and was often pictured with the lion, whose roar resembled thunder. The power attributed to her in war may have arisen from her connection with storms. Inanna was also a fertility figure, and, as goddess of the storehouse and the bride of the god Dumuzi-Amaushumgalana, who represented the growth and fecundity of the date palm, she was characterized as young, beautiful, and impulsive'--never as helpmate or mother. She is sometimes referred to as the Lady of the Date Clusters.
        Ishtar's primary legacy from the Sumerian tradition is the role of fertility figure; she evolved, however, into a more complex character, surrounded in myth by death and disaster, a goddess of contradictory connotations and forces'--fire and fire-quenching, rejoicing and tears, fair play and enmity. The Akkadian Ishtar is also, to a greater extent, an astral deity, associated with the planet Venus. With Shamash, the sun god, and Sin, the moon god, she forms a secondary astral triad. In this manifestation her symbol is a star with 6, 8, or 16 rays within a circle. As goddess of Venus, delighting in bodily love, Ishtar was the protectress of prostitutes and the patroness of the alehouse. Part of her cult worship probably included temple prostitution. Her popularity was universal in the ancient Middle East, and in many centres of worship she probably subsumed numerous local goddesses. In later myth she was known as Queen of the Universe, taking on the powers of An, Enlil, and Enki.
        The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica This article was most recently revised and updated by Adam Augustyn, Managing Editor, Reference Content.
      Edward Bernays - Wikipedia
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 15:36
        Austrian-American public relations pioneer
        Edward Bernays
        Bernays in 1917
        Born ( 1891-11-22 ) November 22, 1891DiedMarch 9, 1995 (1995-03-09) (aged 103)OccupationPublic relations, advertisingNotable work
        Crystallizing Public Opinion (1923), Propaganda (1928), Public Relations (1945), The Engineering of Consent (1955) Spouse(s) ChildrenDoris Held,[2] Anne BernaysParent(s)Ely BernaysAnna FreudRelativesMartha Bernays (aunt)Sigmund Freud (uncle)Isaac Bernays (great-grandfather)Marc Randolph (great-nephew)Edward Louis Bernays (; German: [bÉ›ÉÌ¯ËnaÉªs] ; November 22, 1891 '' March 9, 1995) was an American pioneer in the field of public relations and propaganda, referred to in his obituary as "the father of public relations".[3] Bernays was named one of the 100 most influential Americans of the 20th century by Life.[4] He was the subject of a full-length biography by Larry Tye called The Father of Spin (1999) and later an award-winning 2002 documentary for the BBC by Adam Curtis called The Century of the Self.
        His best-known campaigns include a 1929 effort to promote female smoking by branding cigarettes as feminist "Torches of Freedom", and his work for the United Fruit Company in the 1950s, connected with the CIA-orchestrated overthrow of the democratically elected Guatemalan government in 1954. He worked for dozens of major American corporations including Procter & Gamble and General Electric, and for government agencies, politicians, and non-profit organizations.
        Of his many books, Crystallizing Public Opinion (1923) and Propaganda (1928) gained special attention as early efforts to define and theorize the field of public relations. Citing works of writers such as Gustave Le Bon, Wilfred Trotter, Walter Lippmann, and Sigmund Freud (his own double uncle), he described the masses as irrational and subject to herd instinct'--and outlined how skilled practitioners could use crowd psychology and psychoanalysis to control them in desirable ways.[5][6] Bernays later synthesized many of these ideas in his postwar book, "Public Relations" (1945), which outlines the science of managing information released to the public by an organization, in a manner most advantageous to the organization. He does this by first providing an overview of the history of public relations, and then provides insight into its application.
        Family and education [ edit ] Edward Bernays was born to a Jewish family.[7]
        The Bernays family moved from Vienna to the United States in the 1890s. After Ely Bernays started working as a grain exporter at the Manhattan Produce Exchange, he sent for his wife and children.[8]In 1892, his family moved to New York City, where Bernays attended DeWitt Clinton High School.[9] In 1912 he graduated from Cornell University with a degree in agriculture, but chose journalism as his first career.[10]
        He married Doris E. Fleischman in 1922.[11] Fleischman was a member of the Lucy Stone League, a group which encouraged women to keep their names after marriage.
        Later, however, she changed her mind and her name, becoming Doris Bernays. By all accounts, Fleischman played a major though quiet role in the Bernays public relations business'--including ghost-writing numerous memos and speeches, and publishing a newsletter.[12]
        Career [ edit ] After graduating from Cornell, Bernays wrote for the National Nurseryman journal. Then he worked at the New York City Produce Exchange, where his father was a grain exporter. He went to Paris and worked for Louis Dreyfus and Company, reading grain cables. By December 1912, he had returned to New York.[10]
        Medical editor [ edit ] Following a meeting in New York with school friend Fred Robinson, Bernays became coeditor of Medical Review of Reviews and Dietetic and Hygienic Gazette in 1912. They took editorial positions in favor of showers and against corsets, and distributed free copies to thousands of physicians across the country.[13]
        Two months later they took up the cause of Damaged Goods, an English translation of Les Avari(C)s by Eug¨ne Brieux. After publishing a positive review of the play, Bernays and Robinson wrote to its lead actor, Richard Bennett: "The editors of the Medical Review of Reviews support your praiseworthy intention to fight sex-pruriency in the United States by producing Brieux's play Damaged Goods. You can count on our help."[14]
        The play controversially dealt with venereal disease and prostitution'--Bernays called it "a propaganda play that fought for sex education."[15] He created the "Medical Review of Reviews Sociological Fund Committee" and successfully solicited the support of such elite figures as John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt, Reverend John Haynes Holmes, and Anne Harriman Sands Rutherford Vanderbilt, wife of William Kissam Vanderbilt.[16][17]
        Press agent [ edit ] After his foray into the world of theater, Bernays worked as a creative press agent for various performers and performances. Already, he was using a variety of techniques that would become hallmarks of his later practice. He promoted the Daddy Long Legs stage play by tying it in with the cause of charity for orphans. To create interest in Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, he educated Americans about the subtleties of ballet'--and publicized a picture of Flore Revalles, wearing a tight-fitting dress, at the Bronx Zoo, posed with a large snake. He built up opera singer Enrico Caruso as an idol whose voice was so sensitive that comically extreme measures were taken to protect it.[18]
        World War I [ edit ] After the US entered the war, the Committee on Public Information (CPI) hired Bernays to work for its Bureau of Latin-American Affairs, based in an office in New York. Bernays, along with Lieutenant F. E. Ackerman, focused on building support for war, domestically and abroad, focusing especially on businesses operating in Latin America.[19][20] Bernays referred to this work as "psychological warfare".[21][22]
        After fighting ended, Bernays was part of a sixteen-person publicity group working for the CPI at the Paris Peace Conference. A scandal arose from his reference to propaganda in a press release. As reported by the New York World, the "announced object of the expedition is 'to interpret the work of the Peace Conference by keeping up a worldwide propaganda to disseminate American accomplishments and ideals.'"[23][24]
        Bernays later described a realization that his work for the CPI could also be used in peacetime:
        There was one basic lesson I learned in the CPI'--that efforts comparable to those applied by the CPI to affect the attitudes of the enemy, of neutrals, and people of this country could be applied with equal facility to peacetime pursuits. In other words, what could be done for a nation at war could be done for organizations and people in a nation at peace.[25]
        Counsel on public relations [ edit ] Bernays, who pursued his calling in New York City from 1919 to 1963, styled himself a "public relations counsel". He had very pronounced views on the differences between what he did and what people in advertising did. A pivotal figure in the orchestration of elaborate corporate advertising campaigns and multi-media consumer spectacles, he is among those listed in the acknowledgments section of the seminal government social science study Recent Social Trends in the United States (1933).[26]
        Notable clients and campaigns [ edit ] Bernays used his uncle Sigmund Freud's ideas to help convince the public, among other things, that bacon and eggs was the true all-American breakfast.[27]
        In the 1930s, his Dixie Cup campaign was designed to convince consumers that only disposable cups were sanitary, by linking the imagery of an overflowing cup with subliminal images of vaginas and venereal disease.[28]
        He was publicity director for the 1939 New York World's Fair.[29]
        Light's Golden Jubilee [ edit ] Political clients [ edit ] In 1924 Bernays set up a vaudeville "pancake breakfast" for Calvin Coolidge to change his stuffy image prior to the 1924 election. Entertainers including Al Jolson, John Drew, Raymond Hitchcock, and the Dolly Sisters performed on the White House lawn. The event was widely reported by American newspapers, with The New York Times running the story under the headline "President Nearly Laughs."[30]
        A desperate Herbert Hoover consulted with Bernays a month before the 1932 presidential election. Bernays advised Hoover to create disunity within his opposition and to present an image of himself as an invincible leader.[31]
        Bernays advised William O'Dwyer, in his candidacy for Mayor of New York City, on how to appear in front of different demographics. For example, he should tell Irish voters about his actions against the Italian mafia'--and Italian voters about his plans to reform the police department. To Jews he should appear as a committed opponent of the Nazis.[32]
        He helped to name the President's Emergency Committee for Employment, suggesting this name as preferable to the "Committee for Unemployment".[33]
        During World War II, Bernays advised the United States Information Agency, as well as the Army and Navy. He was chairman of the National Advisory Committee of the Third US War Loan, co-chairman of the Victory Book campaign, and part of the New York State Defense Council.[33]
        Bernays reported turning down the Nazis, Nicaragua under the Somoza family, Francisco Franco, and Richard Nixon as clients.[34]
        Non-profit clients [ edit ] Bernays also worked on behalf of many non-profit institutions and organizations. These included, to name just a few, the Committee on Publicity Methods in Social Work (1926''1927), the Jewish Mental Health Society (1928), the Book Publishers Research Institute (1930''1931), the New York Infirmary for Women and Children (1933), the Committee for Consumer Legislation (1934), and the Friends of Danish Freedom and Democracy (1940).[35][36][37]
        Freud [ edit ] In 1920, Bernays organized the publication of Freud's Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis in the US, sending royalty money to his uncle in Vienna. Freud turned down further offers at promotion, such as a possible lecture tour and an invitation to write 3,000-word newspaper columns, for $1,000 each, on topics such as "The Wife's Mental Place in the Home" and "What a Child Thinks About."[38]
        Tobacco [ edit ] In 1927, Bernays worked briefly for Liggett and Myers, makers of Chesterfield cigarettes. He pulled a stunt against the competing brand, Lucky Strike, which involved mocking the endorsements of opera singers who said Lucky Strikes were "kind to your voice". George Washington Hill, head of the American Tobacco Company, which made Lucky Strike, promptly hired Bernays away from Liggett and Myers.[39]
        "Girl in Red" advertisement for Lucky Strike; shot by
        Nickolas Muray, a photographer enlisted by Bernays to help popularize feminine thinness and cigarette smoking.
        [40]When he started working for American Tobacco Company, Bernays was given the objective of increasing Lucky Strike sales among women, who, for the most part, had formerly avoided smoking. The first strategy was to persuade women to smoke cigarettes instead of eating. Bernays began by promoting the ideal of thinness itself, using photographers, artists, newspapers, and magazines to promote the special beauty of thin women. Medical authorities were found to promote the choice of cigarettes over sweets. Home-makers were cautioned that keeping cigarettes on hand was a social necessity.[40]
        Torches of Freedom [ edit ] The first campaign succeeded; women smoked more cigarettes; American Tobacco Company brought in more revenue; and Lucky Strike led the market in growth. But a taboo remained on women smoking in public. Bernays consulted with psychoanalyst Abraham Brill, a student of Freud's, who reported to him that cigarettes represented "torches of freedom" for women whose feminine desires were increasingly suppressed by their role in the modern world.[41]
        Bernays wrote:[42]
        Because it should appear as news with no division of the publicity, actresses should be definitely out. On the other hand, if young women who stand for feminism'--someone from the Women's Party, say'--could be secured, the fact that the movement would be advertised too, would not be bad. . . . While they should be goodlooking, they should not be too 'model-y.' Three for each church covered should be sufficient. Of course they are not to smoke simply as they come down the church steps. They are to join in the Easter parade, puffing away.
        The march went as planned, as did the ensuing publicity, with ripples of women smoking prominently across the country.[43][44]
        Green Ball [ edit ] In 1934, Bernays was asked to deal with women's apparent reluctance to buy Lucky Strikes because their green and red package clashed with standard female fashions. When Bernays suggested changing the package to a neutral color, Hill refused, saying that he had already spent millions advertising the package. Bernays then worked to make green a fashionable color.[45]
        The centerpiece of his efforts was the Green Ball, a social event at the Waldorf Astoria, hosted by Narcissa Cox Vanderlip. The pretext for the ball and its unnamed underwriter was that proceeds would go to charity. Famous society women would attend wearing green dresses. Manufacturers and retailers of clothing and accessories were advised of the excitement growing around the color green. Intellectuals were enlisted to give highbrow talks on the theme of green. Before the ball had taken place, newspapers and magazines (encouraged in various ways by Bernays's office) had latched on to the idea that green was all the rage.[46]
        Modus operandi [ edit ] Throughout the job, Bernays concealed the fact that he was working for the American Tobacco Company, and succeeded in keeping his own name out of the affair as well. Staff were instructed never to mention his name. Third parties were used, and various notable people received payments to promote smoking publicly as if on their own initiative.[47] (Decades later, however, Bernays boasted about his role.)[48]
        Bernays did not smoke cigarettes himself, and persistently tried to induce his wife Doris to quit.[49]
        United Fruit and Guatemala [ edit ] The United Fruit Company (today's Chiquita Brands International) hired Bernays in the early 1940s for the purpose of promoting banana sales within the United States, which he did by linking bananas to good health and to American interests and by placing them strategically in the hands of celebrities, in hotels, and other conspicuous places. Bernays also argued that United Fruit needed to put a positive spin on the banana-growing countries themselves, and for this purpose created a front group called the Middle America Information Bureau, which supplied information to journalists and academics.[50]
        United Fruit shut down the Middle America Information Bureau in 1948 under the new presidency of Thomas Dudley Cabot. Bernays resented this change but stayed on with the company, for a reported annual fee of more than $100,000.[51] Bernays worked on the national press and successfully drummed up coverage of Guatemala's Communist menace.[52]
        He recommended a campaign in which universities, lawyers, and the US government would all condemn expropriation as immoral and illegal; the company should use media pressure "to induce the President and State Department to issue a policy pronouncement comparable to the Monroe Doctrine concerning expropriation." In the following months, The New York Times, the New York Herald Tribune, Time, Newsweek, and the Atlantic Monthly had all published articles describing the threat of Communism in Guatemala. A Bernays memo in July 1951 recommended that this wave of media attention should be translated into action by promoting:
        (a) a change in present U.S. ambassadorial and consular representation, (b) the imposition of congressional sanctions in this country against government aid to pro-Communist regimes, (c) U.S. government subsidizing of research by disinterested groups like the Brookings Institution into various phases of the problem.[53]
        Per Bernays's strategy, United Fruit distributed favorable articles and an anonymous Report on Guatemala to every member of Congress and to national "opinion molders".[54][55] They also published a weekly Guatemala Newsletter and sent it to 250 journalists, some of whom used it as a source for their reporting.[55]Bernays formed close relationships with journalists including The New York Times reporter Will Lissner and columnist Walter Winchell.[52][53] In January 1952 he brought a cohort of journalists from various notable newspapers on a tour of Guatemala, sponsored by the company. This technique proved highly effective and was repeated four more times.[55]In June, 1954, the US Central Intelligence Agency effected a coup d'(C)tat code-named Operation PBSuccess. The CIA backed a minimal military force, fronted by Carlos Castillo Armas, with a psychological warfare campaign to portray military defeat as a foregone conclusion. During the coup itself, Bernays was the primary supplier of information for the international newswires Associated Press, United Press International and the International News Service.[56][57]
        Following the coup, Bernays built up the image of Guatemala's new president Carlos Castillo Armas, giving advice for his public appearances both in Guatemala and in the US. In 1956, Bernays produced a pamphlet comparing the Communist way and the Christian way.[58]
        In 1959, United Fruit dispensed with all external advisors including Bernays.[59]
        Techniques [ edit ] Third parties [ edit ] Bernays argued that the covert use of third parties was morally legitimate because those parties were morally autonomous actors.[60]
        "If you can influence the leaders, either with or without their conscious cooperation, you automatically influence the group which they sway", he said. In order to promote sales of bacon, for example, he conducted research and found that the American public ate very light breakfast of coffee, maybe a roll and orange juice. He went to his physician and found that a heavy breakfast was sounder from the standpoint of health than a light breakfast because the body loses energy during the night and needs it during the day. He asked the physician if he would be willing, at no cost, to write to 5,000 physicians and ask them whether their judgment was the same as his'--confirming his judgment. About 4,500 answered back, all concurring that a more significant breakfast was better for the health of the American people than a light breakfast. He arranged for this finding to be published in newspapers throughout the country with headlines like '4,500 physicians urge bigger breakfast' while other articles stated that bacon and eggs should be a central part of breakfast and, as a result of these actions, the sale of bacon went up.[61]
        Describing the response to his campaign for Ivory Soap, Bernays wrote: "As if actuated by the pressure of a button, people began working for the client instead of the client begging people to buy."[62]
        Businesses found these covert methods irresistible. Strother Walker and Paul Sklar wrote in Business Finds Its Voice (1938) that Bernays had offered a solution to popular skepticism of business which arose in the depression: better "to implant an idea in a group leader's mind and let him spread it than to write up an idea and send it to the papers as a release, in the old-fashioned way...".[63]
        Scientific approach [ edit ] Bernays pioneered the public relations industry's use of mass psychology and other social sciences to design its public persuasion campaigns: "If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, is it not possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing about it? The recent practice of propaganda has proved that it is possible, at least up to a certain point and within certain limits."[64] He later called this scientific technique of opinion-molding the engineering of consent.[65]
        Bernays expanded on Walter Lippmann's concept of stereotype, arguing that predictable elements could be manipulated for mass effects:
        But instead of a mind, universal literacy has given [the common man] a rubber stamp, a rubber stamp inked with advertising slogans, with editorials, with published scientific data, with the trivialities of tabloids and the profundities of history, but quite innocent of original thought. Each man's rubber stamp is the twin of millions of others, so that when these millions are exposed to the same stimuli, all receive identical imprints. [...]The amazing readiness with which large masses accept this process is probably accounted for by the fact that no attempt is made to convince them that black is white. Instead, their preconceived hazy ideas that a certain gray is almost black or almost white are brought into sharper focus. Their prejudices, notions, and convictions are used as a starting point, with the result that they are drawn by a thread into passionate adherence to a given mental picture.[66]
        Not only psychology but sociology played an important role for the public relations counsel, according to Bernays. The individual is "a cell organized into the social unit. Touch a nerve at a sensitive spot and you get an automatic response from certain specific members of the organism."[67]
        Philosophy [ edit ] Bernays touted the idea that the "masses" are driven by factors outside their conscious understanding, and therefore that their minds can and should be manipulated by the capable few. "Intelligent men must realize that propaganda is the modern instrument by which they can fight for productive ends and help to bring order out of chaos."[62][68][69]
        The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in
        democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an
        invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. ...We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. ...In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of
        politics or business, in our social conduct or our
        ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons...who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.
        -- Propaganda (1928) pp. 9''10
        Propaganda was portrayed as the only alternative to chaos.[70]
        One way Bernays reconciled manipulation with liberalism was his claim that the human masses would inevitably succumb to manipulation'--and therefore the good propagandists could compete with the evil, without incurring any marginal moral cost.[71] In his view, "the minority which uses this power is increasingly intelligent, and works more and more on behalf of ideas that are socially constructive."[72]
        Unlike some other early public relations practitioners, Bernays advocated centralization and planning. Marvin Olasky calls his 1945 book Take Your Place at the Peace Table "a clear appeal for a form of mild corporate socialism."[73]
        Bernays also drew on the ideas of the French writer Gustave Le Bon,[74] the originator of crowd psychology, and of Wilfred Trotter, who promoted similar ideas in the anglophone world in his book Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War.[75]
        Recognition and legacy [ edit ] Much of Bernays' reputation today stems from his persistent public relations campaign to build his own reputation as "America's No. 1 Publicist". During his active years, many of his peers in the industry were offended by Bernays' continuous self-promotion. According to Scott Cutlip, "Bernays was a brilliant person who had a spectacular career, but, to use an old-fashioned word, he was a braggart."[76]
        Bernays attracted positive and negative attention for his grand statements about the role of public relations in society. Reviewers praised Crystallizing Public Opinion (1923) as a pioneering study of the importance of something called public opinion. Propaganda (1928) drew more criticism for its advocacy of mass manipulation.[77]
        In the 1930s, his critics became more harsh. As the leading figure in public relations and a notorious advocate of "propaganda", Bernays was compared to European fascists such as Joseph Goebbels and Adolf Hitler.[78] (Bernays himself wrote in his 1965 autobiography that Goebbels read and used his books.)[79]
        Rather than retreating from the spotlight, Bernays continued to play up his ideas'--for example, stating in a 1935 speech to the Financial Advertisers Association that strong men (including publicists) should become human symbols to lead the masses.[80] On other occasions he tempered this message with the idea that, while propaganda is inevitable, the democratic system allows a pluralism of propaganda, while fascist systems offer only a single official propaganda.[81]
        At the same time, Bernays was praised for his apparent success, wisdom, foresight, and influence as an originator of public relations.[82]
        While opinions ranged negative to positive, there was widespread agreement that propaganda had a powerful effect on the public mind.[83] According to John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, in a published review of Larry Tye's biography of Bernays:[84]
        It is impossible to fundamentally grasp the social, political, economic and cultural developments of the past 100 years without some understanding of Bernays and his professional heirs in the public relations industry. PR is a 20th-century phenomenon, and Bernays'--widely eulogized as the "father of public relations" at the time of his death in 1995'--played a major role in defining the industry's philosophy and methods.
        Publications [ edit ] Books [ edit ] The Broadway Anthology (1917, co-author)Crystallizing Public Opinion (New York: Boni and Liveright, 1923) OCLC 215243834A Public Relations Counsel (1927)An Outline of Careers: A Practical Guide to Achievement by Thirty-Eight Eminent Americans (1927)Verdict of Public Opinion on Propaganda (1927)Propaganda (New York: Horace Liveright. 1928) ISBN 978-0-8046-1511-2This Business of Propaganda (1928)Universities'--Pathfinders in Public Opinion (1937)Careers for Men: A Practical Guide to Opportunity in Business, Written by Thirty-Eight Successful Americans (1939)Speak Up for Democracy: What You Can Do'--A Practical Plan of Action for Every American Citizen (New York: The Viking Press, 1940)Future of Private Enterprise in the Post-War World (1942)Democratic Leadership in Total War (1943)Psychological Blueprint for the Peace'--Canada, U.S.A. (1944)Public Relations (1945)Your Place at the Peace Table. What You Can Do to Win a Lasting United Nations Peace (New York: The Gerent Press, 1945)What the British Think of Us: A Study of British Hostility to America and Americans and Its Motivation, with Recommendations for Improving Anglo-American Relations (1950, co-author with his wife Doris Fleischman)The Engineering of Consent (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1955)(contributor) OCLC 550584Your Future in Public Relations (1961)Biography of an Idea: Memoirs of Public Relations Counsel (1965)Case for Reappraisal of U.S. Overseas Information Policies and Programs (Special Study) (1970), by Edward L. Bernays and Burnet Hershey (editors)Selected articles [ edit ] "The Minority Rules", The Bookman, April 1927, pp. 150''155."Manipulating Public Opinion: The Why and the How", American Journal of Sociology 33(6), May 1928."The Marketing of National Policies: A Study of War Propaganda", Journal of Marketing 6(3), January 1942."Attitude Polls'--Servants or Masters?", Public Opinion Quarterly 9(3), Autumn 1945."The Engineering of Consent", Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 250, March 1947. [dead link ] "An Educational Program for Unions", Industrial and Labor Relations Review 1(1), October 1947."Emergence of the Public Relations Counsel: Principles and Recollections", Business History Review 45(3), Autumn 1971.References [ edit ] ^ Tye (1998), p. 147. "Feeling he was too short, at 5 feet 4 inches, Eddie seemed determined to make everything else larger than life. He even inflated his name with an L., a middle initial that was not on his birth record in Vienna. It apparently stood for Louis, although even his daughters aren't sure, since he didn't like to talk about it. ^ "Edward Bernays, 'Father of Public Relations' And Leader in Opinion Making, Dies at 103". The New York Times . Retrieved January 9, 2021 . ^ "Edward Bernays, 'Father of Public Relations' And Leader in Opinion Making, Dies at 103". The New York Times. March 10, 1995. ^ Ewen, Stuart (1996). "Visiting Edward Bernays". PR! A Social History Of Spin. Basic Books. Archived from the original on September 5, 2008. ^ Bernays, Edward (1923). Crystallizing Public Opinion . Ig Publishing. ISBN 193543926X. ^ Bernays, Edward (1928). Propaganda. Ig Publishing. ISBN 0970312598. ^ Lavin, Maud (July 21, 2002). "A literary couple's muted memoir of 1950s New York". Chicago Tribune. Edward and his wife, Doris Fleischman, were nonpracticing, highly assimilated, wealthy German-American Jews, and Anne grew up a self-professed hothouse flower on New York's Upper East Side. ^ Tye (1998), p. 115. ^ Colford, Paul D. (December 5, 1991). "A Birthday Salute to the Father of Public Relations". Newsday (Nassau ed.). Part II p. 78 . Retrieved February 24, 2016 . ^ a b Tye (1998), 4''5. ^ Cook, Joan (July 12, 1980). "Doris Fleischman Bernays Dead; Pioneer Public Relations Counsel". The New York Times. Metropolitan Report p. 22 . Retrieved February 24, 2016 . ^ Tye (1998), pp. 1''3, 123''124. "Once she resolved to enter her husband's world of public relations, Doris did play a central role in building the Bernays empire, and when the press dubbed him the prince of publicity she could rightfully claim to be the princess. She made her mark first as a wordsmith, churning out press releases and polished stories on clients ranging from the U.S. War Department to the American Tobacco Company. She also conceived of, wrote, and edited a four-page newsletter called Contact, which reprinted parts of speeches and articles on public relations, sorted through new ideas in the field, and promoted the activities of the Bernays office. And she ghost-wrote scores of speeches and strategy papers that were delivered under her husband's name. It's easy to pick out her writings from among the many papers that Eddie Bernays left behind: they're the ones with rich vocabulary and poetic flourish, free from the more formal style that was his trademark." ^ Tye (1998), pp. 5''6. "They used the Medical Review to argue against women wearing corsets with stays and to encourage shower baths; they published expert opinions on health controversies, a relatively novel approach; and they distributed free copies to most of the 137,000 licensed physicians in the United States." ^ Tye (1998), pp. 6''7. "Bennett quickly accepted the offer, pumping up the young editor with visions of a crusade against Victorian mores, promising to recruit actors who would work without pay and prodding him to raise money for the production. Eddie was so excited that he volunteered to underwrite the production." ^ Rampton & Stauber (2001), p. 44. ^ Tye (1998), p. 8. "The key with Damaged Goods, he realized, was to transform the controversy into a cause and recruit backers who already were public role models. The twenty-one-year-old editor formed a Medical Review of Reviews Sociological Fund Committee, then attracted members with an artful appeal that played on Bennett's reputation as an artist as well as the worthiness of battling prudishness. Among those who signed up were John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt Sr., Mr. and Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Dr. William Jay Schieffelin, whose company had recently brought to America a treatment for syphilis, and the Reverent John Haynes Holmes of New York's Unitarian Community Church." ^ Cutlip (1994), p. 162. ^ Tye (1998), pp. 9''16. ^ Tye (1998), p. 18. "Finally given his chance to serve, Eddie recruited Ford, International Harvester, and scores of other American firms to distribute literature on U.S. war aims to foreign contacts and post U.S. propaganda on the windows of 650 American offices overseas. He distributed postcards to Italian soldiers at the front so they could boost morale at home, and he planted propaganda behind the German lines to sow dissent. He organized rallies at Carnegie Hall featuring freedom fighters from Poland, Czechoslovakia, and other states that were anxious to break free of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. And to counter German propaganda he had American propaganda printed in Spanish and Portuguese and inserted into export journals sent across Latin America. "In short, he helped win America over to an unpopular war using precisely the techniques he'd used to promote Daddy Long Legs and the Ballet Russe." ^ James R. Mock, "The Creel Committee in Latin America", The Hispanic American Historical Review 22(2), May 1942, p. 276. "Another section of the New York office, however, was especially concerned with publicity channels and publicity for the nations south of us. This was the division known as the Bureau of Latin-American Affairs, with Edward L. Bernays and Lieutenant F. E. Ackerman playing possibly the leading roles. That organization appealed especially to American firms doing business in Latin America, and secured their cooperation. In addition to means already cited, this section utilized various kinds of educators, especially as a medium of distributing pamphlets." ^ Ewen (1996), pp. 162''163. "During the war years, Bernays joined the army of publicists rallied under the banner of the CPI and concentrated on propaganda efforts aimed at Latin American business interests. Within this vast campaign of "psychological warfare", as he described it, Bernays'--like others of his generation'--began to develop an expanded sense of publicity and its practical uses." ^ Axelrod, Alan (2009). Selling the Great War: The Making of American Propaganda. St. Martin's Publishing Group. p. 200. ISBN 978-0-230-61959-3 . Retrieved May 21, 2020 . ^ Tye (1998), p. 19. ^ Cutlip (1994), p. 165. "Bernays' release announced that the Official Press Mission to the Peace Conference was leaving the next day for Paris and instead of the narrow technical press support mission Creel had defined for the group, Bernays inserted this sentence: 'The announced object of the expedition is to interpret the work of the Peace Conference by keeping up a worldwide propaganda to disseminate American accomplishments and ideals.' Two days later, the New York World headlined the story: 'TO INTERPRET AMERICAN IDEALS.' George Creel was furious; already in a battle with Congress, Creel knew that this would add fat to the fire. He disavowed the story. Nonetheless, it hastened the demise of the CPI." ^ Cutlip (1994), p. 168. ^ ^ Alix Spiegel. "Freud's Nephew and the Origins of Public Relations", Morning Edition, 2005-04-22 ^ Alan Bilton (2013). Silent Film Comedy and American Culture. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 16. ISBN 978-1-137-02025-3. ^ See "The New York world's fair, a symbol for democracy", address by Bernays to the Merchant's Association of New York, 7 April 1937. ^ Tye (1998), pp 77''79. See "Breakfast With Coolidge" typescript, prepared 8 February 1962. ^ Tye (1988), pp. 79'' 80. ^ Tye (1998), pp. 81''83. ^ a b Tye (1998), pp. 84''85. ^ Tye (1998), p. 89. ^ Bernays, Edward L. (1965). Biography of an idea: memoirs of public relations counsel . Simon and Schuster. p. 606. I offered to help organize the Friends of Danish Freedom and Democracy, made up for the most part of Americans of Danish ... ^ Hasselriis, Caspar Henrik Wolffsen (1959). Helligdag: erindringer (in Danish). Udgivet af Dansk samvirke hos E. Munksgaard. p. 143. ... at han vilde engagere den kendte Public Relations Ekspert Edward L. Bernays til at v...re Raadgiver. ... Resultatet blev Dannelsen af "American Friends of Danish Freedom and Democracy", et Navn foreslaaet af Mr. Bernays, som mente, ... ^ Jensen, Mette Bastholm; Jensen, Steven L. B. (2003). Denmark and the Holocaust. Institute for International Studies, Department for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. ISBN 978-87-989305-1-8. The "Father of Public Relations and Spin" and nephew of Sigmund Freud Edward L. Bernays (1890''1995), was also hired by the Friends of Danish Freedom and Democracy as a ... ^ Tye (1998), pp. 185''190. ^ Tye (1998), 35''36. ^ a b Tye (1998), pp. 23''26. "Bernays launched the campaign against sweets with his tried-and-true tactic of enlisting 'experts,' in this case convincing Nickolas Muray, a photographer friend, to ask other photographers and artists to sing praises of the thin. 'I have come to the conclusion,' Muray wrote, 'that the slender woman who, combining suppleness and grace with slenderness, who instead of overeating sweets and deserts, lights a cigarette, as the advertisements say, has created a new standard of female loveliness. . . . I am interested in knowing if my own judgment concurs with that of others, and should be most happy to have your opinion on the subject.'" ^ Tye (1998), pp. 27''28. "Bernays understood they were up against a social taboo that cast doubt on the character of women who smoked, but he wasn't sure of the basis of the inhibition or how it could be overcome. So he got Hill to agree to pay for a consultation with Dr. A. A. Brill, a psychoanalyst and disciple of Bernays's uncle, Dr. Sigmund Freud. "'It is perfectly normal for women to want to smoke cigarettes,' Brill advised. 'The emancipation of women has suppressed many of their feminine desires. More women now do the same work as men do. Many women bear no children; those who do bear have fewer children. Feminine traits are masked. Cigarettes, which are equated with men, become torches of freedom.'"That rang a bell for Bernays. Why not organize a parade of prominent women lighting their 'torches of freedom'? And do it on Easter Sunday, a holiday symbolizing freedom of spirit, on Fifth Avenue, America's most prestigious promenade?" ^ Tye (1998), p. 29. ^ Tye (1998), pp. 30''31. "The actual march went off more smoothly than even its scriptwriters imagined. Ten young women turned out, marching down Fifth Avenue with their lighted 'torches of freedom,' and the newspapers loved it. [...] Miss Hunt issued the following communiqu(C) from the smoke-clouded battlefield: 'I hope that we have started something and that these torches of freedom, with no particular brand favored, will smash the discriminatory taboo on cigarettes for women and that our sex will go on breaking down all discriminations.'Go on they did. During the following days women were reported to be taking to the streets, lighted cigarettes in hand, in Boston and Detroit, Wheeling and San Francisco." ^ "Group of Girls Puff at Cigarettes as a Gesture of 'Freedom'" (part of a headline), The New York Times, 1 April 1929. ^ Tye (1998), p. 38. ^ Tye (1998), p. 39. "Vogelman signed up and invited fashion editors to the Waldorf for a Green Fashions Fall Luncheon with, of course, green menus featuring green beans, asparagus-tip salad, broiled French lamb chops with haricots verts and olivette potatoes, pistachio mousse glac(C), green mints, and cr¨me de menthe. The head of the Hunter College art department gave a talk entitled "Green in the Work of Great Artists," and a noted psychologist enlightened guests on the psychological implications of the color green. The press took note, with the New York Sun headline reading, "It looks like a Green Winter." The Post predicted a "Green Autumn," and one of the wire services wrote about "fall fashions stalking the forests for their color note, picking green as the modish fall wear." ^ Tye (1998), pp. 31''32. "One way he found citizens and specialists was by offering money. Sometimes it came as an honorarium, like the $100 he proposed paying 'a dietician [who] talks on diet as the best means to produce moderate curves' and a 'physiologist induced to comment on benefits of modern trend to reasonable figure.' Then there was the $5000 he offered to donate to the favorite charity of Mrs. Charles Dana Gibson, wife of the creator of the renowned Gibson Girl illustrations, if she would agree to sign a statement saying 'she smoked Luckies and that they were kind to her throat.'" ^ Tye (1998), pp. 33''34. "If he began by disguising his role in the battle to get women smoking, Bernays more than made up for that in later years. The parade story in particular became part of his repertoire on the speaking circuit and in scores of interviews until his death in 1995, and with each retelling the tale got more colorful and his claims more sweeping. In his 1965 memoirs, for instance, he discussed the slow process of breaking down conventions like the taboo against women smoking. But by 1971 he was telling an oral historian at Columbia University that 'overnight the taboo was broken by one overt act,' the 1929 Easter Sunday march." ^ Tye (1998), pp. 27, 48. "Whatever his attitude in public, at home he did all he could to persuade his wife, Doris, to give up her pack-a-day habit." ^ Tye (1998), pp. 160''164. Tye notes: "The bureau even renamed the region, explaining that 'Middle America' was 'a rational and timely expansion of the phrase 'Central America,' which by long usage includes only the republics of Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama, and the colony of British Honduras.' Middle America would include those countries, along with Mexico and the Caribbean island republics of Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic." ^ Tye (1998), pp. 164''165. Tye's source for Bernays's $100,000 fee is probably Thomas McCann, whom he quotes on p. 178 as saying: "My estimate is we were spending in excess of $100,000 a year for Edward L. Bernays, just for his consulting services, which was an enormous amount of money in 1952." ^ a b Richard H. Immerman, The CIA in Guatemala: The Foreign Policy of Intervention; University of Texas Press, 1982; ninth printing, 2004; ISBN 0-292-71083-6; pp. 112''114. ^ a b Tye (1998), pp. 167''170. ^ Tye (1998), p. 175. ^ a b c John Kirch, "Covering a Coup: The American Press and Guatemala in 1954 Archived 2012-06-23 at the Wayback Machine", Paper presented at AEJMC National Convention, Washington DC; August 2007. ^ ‰tienne Dasso, "Aux origines du coup d'‰tat de 1954 au Guatemala : le r´le de la United Fruit Company dans la pr(C)paration du soul¨vement contre Jacobo Arbenz", L'Ordinaire des Am(C)riques 210 (2010), pp. 175''192. ^ Tye (1998), p. 176. "His Library of Congress files show he remained a key source of information for the press, especially the liberal press, right through the takeover. In fact, as the invasion was commencing on June 18, his papers indicate hew as giving the 'first news anyone received on the situation' to the Associated Press, United Press, the International News Service, and The New York Times, with contacts intensifying over the next several days." ^ Tye (1998), p. 179. "And in 1956 Bernays came up with the idea of widely disseminating a comparison of the teachings of the Communists with those of the church. 'Hate is the driving force of communism,' the report concluded, whereas 'charity is the impelling motive of Christianity.' And under communism 'there is no moral law' and 'no personal liberty,' whereas in Christianity 'the moral law is the way which man is created to follow' and 'free will means liberty is possible, the liberty of the sons of God to do the right.'" ^ Tye (1998), p. 180. ^ Marks (1957), p. 82. "Bernays once spoke directly to the question of the ethics of a propagandist's speaking through a 'front.' There is no evidence that, at the time, he convinced anyone; but his position is worth considering as contrast to the prevailing judgment. While he readily admitted that a propagandist may not ethically buy the cooperation of a third party, he argued that it is perfectly legitimate for him to enlist the aid of a third party and conceal the relationship. The third party becomes a new advocate, not a subsidiary of the first. He continued:That individual or organization may then propagandize it [the original client's point of view] through its own channels because it is interested in it. In such a case, the point of origin then becomes that individual or organization. The public relations counsel, having made the link between the interest of his client and the interest of the third party, no longer need figure in the resulting expression to the public. [Bernays, 'This Business of Propaganda,' p. 199.]
        ^ "Edward L. Bernays tells the story of making bacon & eggs all-American Breakfast". ^ a b Marks (1957), p. 73. ^ Quoted in Olasky (1984), p. 10. ^ Bernays, Edward (2005) [1928]. Propaganda. Brooklyn, N.Y: Ig Pub. p. 47. ISBN 0970312598. ^ Bernays, Edward L. (March 1947). "The Engineering of Consent" (PDF) . Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 250 (1): 113''20 at p. 114. doi:10.1177/000271624725000116. ISSN 0002-7162. S2CID 167534969. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 13, 2012 . Retrieved February 24, 2016 . Any person or organization depends ultimately on public approval, and is therefore faced with the problem of engineering the public's consent to a program or goal. ^ Bernays, "The Minority Rules" (1927), pp. 150, 151; cited in Marks (1957), p. 116. ^ Bernays, Propaganda (book) (1928), p. 28; quoted in Olasky (1985), p. 20. ^ Bernays, Propaganda (book) (1928), p. 159. Quoted in Olasky (1984), p. 3. ^ Olasky (1985), p. 17. "... his belief that behind-the-scenes controllers should exercise 'social responsibility' by devising clever public relations campaigns to direct 'human herds' into appropriate corals." ^ Olasky (1985), p. 19.; Olasky (1984), p. 19, f. 40. "Bernays emphasized that in a large scale society there were only two choices: manipulation or social chaos. He saw history moving in a certain direction and public relations practitioners obliged to climb on the locomotive". ^ Olasky (1984), pp. 13''14. "What Potter did not understand, though, is that the contradictions apparent to a classically-trained political scientist formed a seamless web in the new world of public relations that Bernays was proposing. If the 'individual common man' has no real individuality, as Bernays argued in Propaganda '' only 'rubber stamping' by one propagandist or another, then one more duping does no harm to individual souls. And if Hitler had hit upon the techniques and used them for evil purposes, then that would be all the more reason-- given the inevitability of these techniques being put into use and the inability of men to resist them-- for those hoping to avoid the chaos to rush the techniques into use before evil could turn them into a triumph of fire." ^ Bernays, "The Minority Rules" (1927), p. 155; quoted in Marks (1957), p. 182. ^ Olasky (1984), p. 12. "Bernays, however, anticipated greater centralization in government and media, and the consequent growth of a new bureaucracy. He advocated governmental licensing of public relations counselors, or at the least a set pattern of formal, university training befitting those who would form a latter-day mandarin class. Bernays also tried to enlist proponents of greater economic centralization in his public-relations planning. ^ StormCloudsGathering. "Rule from the Shadows - The Psychology of Power". StormCloudsGathering . Retrieved November 28, 2017 . ^ Strottman, Christine (June 18, 2013). "Edward L. Bernays". www.transatlanticperspectives.org. Archived from the original on December 1, 2017 . Retrieved November 28, 2017 . ^ Cutlip (1994), p. 160. ^ Olasky (1984), pp. 4''6. ^ Olasky (1984), p. 8. "Bernays' own public relations also tended to suffer when comparisons were made between his techniques and those of the Nazis. One book in 1934, for instance, criticized the techniques of propaganda 'carried into perfection by the Lord Northcliffes in wartime England, the Edward Bernays in industrial America, and the Dr. Goebbels in fascist Germany.' Barrons linked American and German-style public relations in 1935 when it noted that 'Hitler, by making what Bernays calls "Devils" for the German masses to look down upon, has aroused the acclaim of the more easily swayed masses.' A 1934 article by Abraham H. Cohen in Opinion noted that Bernays had written a preface to a book on public opinion and commented, 'Now that the art of Ivy Lee and Edward Bernays has been reduced to a science, and is receiving the attention of the Universities, we may soon look to a new crop of manipulators of the public will. Who knows, but that a new American Goebbels...is now pouring over this book." ^ Bernays (1965), p. 652. Quoted in Dennis W. Johnson, Routledge Handbook of Political Management, (New York: Routledge, 2009), p. 314 n. 3; and in Tye (1998), p. 111. Karl von Wiegand, foreign correspondent of the Hearst newspapers, an old hand at interpreting Europe and just returned from Germany, was telling us about Goebbels and his propaganda plans to consolidate Nazi power. Goebbels had shown Wiegand his propaganda library, the best Wiegand had ever seen. Goebbels, said Wiegand, was using my book Crystallizing Public Opinion as a basis for his destructive campaign against the Jews of Germany. This shocked me. ... Obviously the attack on the Jews of Germany was no emotional outburst of the Nazis, but a deliberate, planned campaign.
        ^ Olasky (1984), pp. 8''9. "Bernays himself added some gasoline to this fire when he argued, as did Goebbels, for the necessity of strong men, human gods, to emerge as influencers of public opinion; for instance, in a speech to the Financial Advertisers Association in 1935, Bernays said that the main answer to financial problems is 'to acquire an entire new set of outstanding human living symbols that will hold public confidence...Publicists, economists, leaders in research, the heads of great educational institutions can and should be made the human symbols to bring new faith and strength.' Journalists compared statements of that sort by Bernays to the thoughts of Goebbels or, alternately, Stalin." ^ Marks (1957), p. 200 "By that time [the mid-1930s] he had developed a keen sense of the threat from fascism and frequently urged that the democracies use propaganda in their own defense. It was in this context that Bernays began treating propaganda as synonymous with free speech and debate, as an unexceptional feature of democracy itself rather than as its antithesis. As a participant on 'Town Meeting of the Air' in 1937 he said, Propaganda is the voice of the people in the democracy of today because it gives everyone an opportunity to present his point of view. Fascist or Communist societies have no alternate propagandas; they must accept the official propagandas of those in power. [...]
        ^ Olasky (1984), p. 9. "Bernays was able to overcome criticism partly because there was, for many, little arguing with success. Life in 1933 noted that '...at 1 Wall St., there is Edw. L. Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud, who has probably made more money out of applied psycho-analysis than all Vienna ever saw.' The Bulletin of the Financial Advertisers Association examined profit figures in 1935 and then called Bernays 'the outstanding counsel on public relations in the United States today, a profession he was largely instrumental in creating.'" ^ Marks (1957), p. 99. "And Bernays' word was respected. Said the Committee on Propaganda of the National Education Association, citing Bernays and, incidentally using another conventional metaphor, 'This continual and universal activity [i.e. of the 'thousands of highly trained and ingenious men' who work at 'the great occupation of "putting it over"'] is regimenting the public mind as an army regiments the bodies of its soldiers.' In addition, there was a plethora of independent testimony such as that of the utility executive who told the F. T. C. that without the industry's propaganda 'state, municipal, and Government [sic] ownership would have been 100% ahead of what it is today; and Adolf Hitler's widely quoted comment that 'by sagacious and persistent use of propaganda heaven itself may be presented to a people as hell and, inversely, the most wretched existence as paradise.'" ^ Stauber, John and Sheldon Rampton. "Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays and the Birth of PR" (book review). PR Watch 6:2, Second Quarter, 1999 (p. 11). Sources [ edit ] Bernays, Edward. Biography of an Idea: Memoirs of Public Relations Counsel Edward L. Bernays New York: Simon and Schuster, 1965.Cutlip, Scott M. The Unseen Power: Public Relations. A History. Hove, UK: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1994. ISBN 0-8058-1465-5Ewen, Stuart. PR! A Social History of Spin. New York: Basic Books (Perseus), 1996. ISBN 0-465-06179-6Marks, Barry Alan. "The Idea of Propaganda in America." PhD dissertation accepted at the University of Minnesota, 1957.Olasky, Marvin. "Reception of Edward Bernays' Doctrine of 'Manipulating Public Opinion". Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, 6 August 1984; (ERIC).Olasky, Marvin. "Bringing 'Order Out of Chaos": Edward Bernays and the Salvation of Society Through Public Relations". Journalism History, 12(1), Spring 1985.Rampton, Sheldon, and John Stauber. Trust Us, We're Experts! How Industry Manipulates Science and Gambles With Your Future. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 2001. ISBN 1-58542-059-XTye, Larry. The Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays and the Birth of Public Relations. New York: Crown, 1998. ISBN 0805067892Further reading [ edit ] American National Biography v. 2, Oxford University Press, 1999.John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, Toxic Sludge Is Good For You: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations IndustryEdward Bernays, Biography of an Idea: Memoirs of a Public Relations Counsel (excerpt )Curtis, Adam (November 26, 2008). "Century Of Self. 1-1 Happiness Machines". BBC . Retrieved February 12, 2010 . "Freud's Nephew and the Origins of Public Relations". National Public Radio . Retrieved February 12, 2010 . Nimmo, Dan D.; Chevelle Newsome (1997). Political Commentators in the United States in the 20th Century: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. pp. 1''9. ISBN 0-313-29585-9. Marvin Olasky column on his interview with Bernays at Townhall.comWilfred Trotter (1919). Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War '' 4th impression, with postscript. New York, MacMillan.Stephen Bender. Karl Rove & the Spectre of Freud's Nephew, LewRockwell.com, 2005-02-04External links [ edit ] Edward L. Bernays papers at Library of Congress (finding aid)Some Bernays papers at LOC are online as part of "Prosperity and Thrift: The Coolidge Era and the Consumer Economy, 1921''1929".The Edward L. Bernays papers, 1982''1998 (bulk 1993''1995) are located in the Northeastern University Libraries, Archives and Special Collections Department, Boston, MA.Torches of Freedom Video ClipEdward L. Bernays tells the story of "Torches of Freedom" in his own words '' video clip ''1999"Everett Dean Martin and Edward L. Bernays, Are We Victims of Propaganda? (Library of Congress reproduction from The Forum Magazine, March, 1929)". Memory.loc.gov . Retrieved February 12, 2010 . Appearances on C-SPANWorks by Edward Bernays at Project GutenbergWorks by or about Edward Bernays at Internet ArchiveLETTER TO MR. EDWARD L. BERNAYS FROM <Sanitized> RDP80B01676R003800020083-0 ; "LETTER TO MR. EDWARD L. BERNAYS FROM <Sanitized> RDP80B01676R003800020084-9 ", 1958, Central Intelligence Agency,
      Public Relations '' Edward Bernays's ''Torches of Freedom''
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        Picture this. On the crowded streets of one of the world's busiest cities, a group of influential young people does something carefully planned but also unexpected by the crowds around them. Behind-the-scenes organizers have worked social networks and even mainstream media to maximize coverage, and the perfectly choreographed event draws the attention of onlookers. Some are shocked. Some are delighted. But it becomes apparent that the event was staged for more than just shock value or entertainment. Some see it as the start of a social movement.
        No, this isn't a reference to ''Frozen Grand Central'' in early 2008, when 207 agents of the group Improv Everywhere stopped in their tracks and froze in place for five minutes in the midst of Grand Central Station, later garnering more than 30 million YouTube hits. It's also not about the 'Worldwide Pillowfight Day' flash mobs organized a few months later for fun and entertainment in dozens of cities from Atlanta to Zurich. Neither is it part of the infamous Facebook-driven, iPod-wearing, disco-dancing mob that shut down a London train station in 2009.
        Long before carefully orchestrated surprise street events were termed 'flash mobs,' Edward Bernays organized the Torches of Freedom event as part of a sophisticated persuasive campaign. How did Bernays link smoking a cigarette with women's fight for equality?
        Instead, the event described was the ''Torches of Freedom'' march; the 'influentials' were New York debutantes; and the site was an Easter parade on Fifth Avenue in New York. The date, however, was 1930 and the man behind the scenes was Edward Bernays. Bernays competes with Ivy Lee for the legacy of being known as the father of public relations. Oh, and about those ''torches of freedom,'' they were cigarettes marketed to women.
        Bernays coordinated the Torches of Freedom event on behalf of his client George Washington Hill, president of the American Tobacco Company. Here is how Bernays recalls the project in his memoir Biography of an Idea:
        ''Hill called me in. ''How can we get women to smoke on the street? They're smoking indoors. But, damn it, if they spend half the time outdoors and we can get 'em to smoke outdoors, we'll damn near double our female market. Do something. Act!''
        ''There's a taboo against such smoking,'' I said. ''Let me consult an expert, Dr. A.A. Brill, the psychoanalyst. He might give me the psychological basis for a woman's desire to smoke, and maybe this will help me.''
        ''What will it cost?''
        ''I suppose just a consultation fee.''
        ''Shoot,'' said Hill.
        (Bernays was no stranger to psychoanalysis. His uncle was Sigmund Freud.)
        Brill explained to me: ''Some women regard cigarettes as symbols of freedom,'' he told me. ''Smoking is a sublimation of oral eroticism; holding a cigarette in the mouth excites the oral zone. It is perfectly normal for women to want to smoke cigarettes'... But today the emancipation of women has suppressed many of their feminine desires'... Feminine traits are masked. Cigarettes, which are equated with men, become torches of freedom.''
        ''In this last statement I found a way to help break the taboo against women smoking in public. Why not a parade of women lighting torches of freedom '' smoking cigarettes?''
        Bernays called friends at Vogue magazine to get a list of debutantes. Then he had his secretary, Bertha Hunt, sign and send a personalized telegram to each one. Think direct-messaging; 1930's style:
        ''IN THE INTERESTS OF EQUALITY OF THE SEXES AND TO FIGHT ANOTHER SEX TABOO I AND OTHER YOUNG WOMEN WILL LIGHT ANOTHER TORCH OF FREEDOM BY SMOKING CIGARETTES WHILE STROLLING ON FIFTH AVENUE EASTER SUNDAY. WE ARE DOING THIS TO COMBAT THE SILLY PREJUDICE THAT THE CIGARETTE IS SUITABLE FOR THE HOME, THE RESTAURANT, THE TAXICAB, THE THEATER LOBBY, BUT NEVER NO NEVER FOR THE SIDEWALK. WOMEN SMOKERS AND THEIR ESCORTS WILL STROLL FROM FORTY-EIGHTH STREET TO FIFTY-FOURTH STREET ON FIFTH AVENUE BETWEEN ELEVEN-THIRTY AND ONE O'CLOCK.''
        It worked. Bernays reported that the event made front-page news in both photos and text and opened editorial debates in the weeks that followed in publications from coast to coast. As evidence of his success he cited newspaper reports in Massachusetts, Michigan, California, and West Virginia that women were smoking on the streets. ''Age-old customs, I learned, could be broken down by a dramatic appeal, disseminated by the network of media.'' While Bernays' strategy was mostly intuitive and his reasoning was mostly theoretical, the case illustrates the power of public relations tactics as powerful tools for persuasion.
        Edward Bernays. Biography of an Idea: Memoirs of Public Relations Counsel Edward L. Bernays (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1965), 386.Bernays, 387.Bernays, 387.
      The Color Purple - Wikipedia
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        1982 novel by Alice Walker
        The Color Purple is a 1982 epistolary novel by American author Alice Walker which won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction.[1][a] It was later adapted into a film and musical of the same name.
        The novel has been the frequent target of censors and appears on the American Library Association list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2000''2009 at number seventeen because of the sometimes explicit content, particularly in terms of violence.[2][3] In 2003, the book was listed on the BBC's The Big Read poll of the UK's "best-loved novels."[4]
        Plot [ edit ] Celie is a poor, uneducated 14-year-old girl living in the Southern United States in the early 1900s. She writes letters to God because her father, Alphonso, beats and rapes her. Alphonso has already impregnated Celie once, which resulted in the birth of a boy named Adam, whom Alphonso abducted. Celie thinks Alphonso killed Adam. Celie then has a second child, and Celie's ailing mother dies after cursing Celie on her deathbed. The second child is a girl named Olivia, but Alphonso takes the baby away shortly after birth.
        Celie and her younger sister, 12-year-old Nettie, learn a man identified only as Mister wants to marry Nettie. Alphonso refuses to let Nettie marry, instead arranging for Mister to marry Celie. Mister, a widower, needing someone to care for his children and keep his house, eventually accepts the offer. Mister physically, sexually, and verbally abuses Celie, and all his children mistreat her as well.
        Shortly thereafter, Nettie runs away from Alphonso and takes refuge at Celie's house, where Mister makes sexual advances toward her. Celie then advises Nettie to seek assistance from a well-dressed black woman that she saw in the general store a while back; the woman has unknowingly adopted Olivia and is the only black woman Celie has ever seen with money of her own. Nettie is forced to leave after promising to write. Celie, however, never receives any letters and concludes her sister is dead.
        Time passes, and Harpo, Mister's son, falls in love with an assertive girl named Sofia, who becomes pregnant with Harpo's baby and, despite initial resistance from Mister, marries Harpo. Harpo and Sofia have five more children in short order. Celie is amazed by Sofia's defiant refusal to submit to Harpo's attempts to control her. As Harpo is kinder and gentler than his father, Celie advises him not to dominate Sofia. Harpo temporarily follows Celie's advice but falls back under Mister's sway. Celie, momentarily jealous of Harpo's genuine love of Sofia, then advises Harpo to beat her. Sofia fights back, however, and confronts Celie. A guilty Celie apologizes and confides in Sofia about all the abuse she suffers at Mister's hands. She also begins to consider Sofia's advice about defending herself against further abuse from Mister.
        Shug Avery, a jazz and blues singer and Mister's long-time mistress falls ill, and Mister takes her into his house. Celie, who has been fascinated by photos of Shug she found in Mister's belongings, is thrilled to have her there. Mister's father expresses disapproval of the arrangement, reminding Mister that Shug has three out-of-wedlock children, though Mister implies to him he is those children's father. Mister's father then leaves in disgust. While Shug is initially rude to Celie, who has taken charge of nursing her, the two women become friends, and Celie soon finds herself infatuated with Shug.
        Frustrated by Harpo's domineering behavior, Sofia moves out, taking her children with her. Several months later, Harpo opens a juke joint where a fully recovered Shug performs nightly. Shug decides to stay when she learns Mister beats Celie when she is away. Shug and Celie grow closer.
        Sofia returns for a visit and promptly gets into a fight with Harpo's new girlfriend, Squeak, knocking Squeak's teeth out. In town one day, while Sofia is enjoying a day out with her new boyfriend, a prizefighter, and their respective children, she gets into a physical fight with the mayor after his wife, Miss Millie, insults Sofia and her children. The police arrive and brutally beat Sofia, leaving her with a cracked skull, broken ribs, her face rendered nearly unrecognizable, and blind in one eye. She is subsequently sentenced to 12 years in prison.
        Squeak, mixed-race and Sheriff Hodges' illegitimate niece, attempts to blackmail the sheriff into releasing Sofia, resulting in her being raped by her uncle. Squeak cares for Sofia's children while she is incarcerated, and the two women develop a friendship. Sofia is eventually released and begins working for Miss Millie, which she detests.
        Despite being newly married to a man called Grady, Shug instigates a sexual relationship with Celie on her next visit. One night Shug asks Celie about her sister, and Shug helps Celie recover letters from Nettie that Mister has been hiding from her for decades. The letters indicate Nettie befriended a missionary couple, Samuel and Corrine, the well-dressed woman Celie saw in the store. Nettie eventually accompanied them to Africa to do missionary work. Samuel and Corrine have unwittingly adopted both Adam and Olivia. Corrine, noticing her adopted children resemble Nettie, wonders if Samuel fathered the children with her. Increasingly suspicious, Corrine tries to limit Nettie's role in her family.
        Through her letters, Nettie reveals she has become disillusioned with her missionary work. Corrine became ill with a fever, and Nettie asked Samuel to tell her how he adopted Olivia and Adam. Realizing Adam and Olivia are Celie's children, Nettie then learned Alphonso is actually her and Celie's stepfather. Their actual father was a store owner that white men lynched because they resented his success. She also learned their mother suffered a mental collapse after her husband's death and that Alphonso exploited the situation to control their mother's considerable wealth.
        Nettie confessed to Samuel and Corrine she is the children's biological aunt. The gravely ill Corrine refused to believe her until Nettie reminds her of her previous encounter with Celie in the store. Later, Corrine died, finally having accepted Nettie's story. Meanwhile, Celie visits Alphonso, who confirms Nettie's story. Celie begins to lose some of her faith in God, which she confides to Shug, who explains to Celie her own unique religious philosophy. Shug helps Celie realize God is not someone who has power over her like the rest of the men in Celie's life. Rather, God is an ''it'' and not a ''who."
        Having had enough of her husband's abuse, Celie decides to leave Mister along with Shug and Squeak, who is considering a singing career of her own. Celie puts a curse on Mister before leaving him for good, settling in Tennessee and supporting herself as a seamstress.
        Alphonso dies, Celie inherits his land and moves back into her childhood home. Around this time, Shug falls in love with Germaine, a member of her band, and this news crushes Celie. Shug travels with Germaine, all the while writing postcards to Celie. Celie pledges to love Shug even if Shug does not love her back.
        Celie learns that Mister, suffering from a considerable decline in fortunes after Celie left him, has changed dramatically, and Celie begins to call him by his first name, Albert. Albert proposes that they marry "in the spirit as well as in the flesh," but Celie declines.
        Meanwhile, Nettie and Samuel marry and prepare to return to America. Before they leave, Adam marries Tashi, an African girl. Following an African tradition, Tashi undergoes the painful rituals of female circumcision and facial scarring. In solidarity, Adam undergoes the same facial scarring ritual.
        As Celie realizes that she is content in her life without Shug, Shug returns, having ended her relationship with Germaine. Nettie, Samuel, Olivia, Adam, and Tashi all arrive at Celie's house. Nettie and Celie reunite after 30 years and introduce one another to their respective families.
        Critical reception [ edit ] The Color Purple won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1983, making Walker the first black woman to win the prize.[5][6][7] Walker also won the National Book Award for Fiction in 1983.[8][7] Mel Watkins of the New York Times Book Review wrote that it is a "striking and consummately well-written novel", praising its powerful emotional impact and epistolary structure.[9] It was also named a PBS Great American Read Top 100 Pick.[7]
        Though the novel has garnered critical acclaim, it has also been the subject of controversy. The American Library Association placed it on the list of top hundred banned and challenged books in the United States from 1990 to 1999 (17),[10] 2000 to 2009 (17),[11] and 2010 to 2019 (50),[12] as well as the top ten list for 2007 (6) and 2009 (9).[13]
        It is 17th on the American Library Association's list of most frequently challenged or banned books.[14] Commonly cited justifications for banning the book include sexual explicitness, explicit language, violence, and homosexuality.[15] The book received greater scrutiny amidst controversy surrounding the release of the film adaptation in 1985.[16] The controversy centered around the depiction of black men, which some critics saw as feeding stereotypical narratives of black male violence, while others found the representation compelling and relatable.[17]
        On November 5, 2019, the BBC News listed The Color Purple on its list of the 100 most influential novels.[18]
        Adaptations [ edit ] The novel was adapted into a film of the same name in 1985. It was directed by Steven Spielberg and stars Whoopi Goldberg as Celie, Danny Glover as Albert, and Oprah Winfrey as Sofia. Though nominated for eleven Academy Awards, it won none. This perceived snubbing ignited controversy because many critics considered it the best picture that year,[19] including Roger Ebert.[20]
        On December 1, 2005, a musical adaptation of the novel and film with lyrics and music by Stephen Bray, Brenda Russell and Allee Willis, and book by Marsha Norman opened at The Broadway Theatre in New York City. The show was produced by Scott Sanders, Quincy Jones, Harvey Weinstein, and Oprah Winfrey, who was also an investor.[21]
        In 2008 BBC Radio 4 broadcast a radio adaptation of the novel in ten 15-minute episodes as a Woman's Hour serial, with Nadine Marshall as Celie, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Nina Sosanya and Eamonn Walker. The script was by Patricia Cumper, and in 2009 the production received the Sony Radio Academy Awards Silver Drama Award.[22]
        Boycotting Israel [ edit ] As part of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS), the author declined publication of the book in Israel[23] in 2012. This decision was criticized by Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz, who argued that Walker "resorted to bigotry and censorship against Hebrew-speaking readers of her writings".[24] Walker, an ardent pro-Palestinian activist, said in a letter to Yediot Books that Israel practices apartheid and must change its policies before her works can be published there.[25]
        Editions [ edit ] ISBN 0-15-119153-0 (First Edition, 1982)ISBN 0-606-00587-0 (prebound, 1985)ISBN 0-671-45853-1 (paperback, June,1983)ISBN 0-671-61702-8 (mass market paperback, 1985)ISBN 0-671-64745-8 (mass market paperback, 1987)ISBN 0-671-66878-1 (paperback, 1988)ISBN 0-15-119154-9 (hardcover, 1992, Anniversary Edition)ISBN 1-56849-628-1 (library binding, 1995, reprint)ISBN 0-671-01907-4 (paperback, 1998)ISBN 0-7641-2064-6 (paperback, 2002)ISBN 0-15-602835-2 (paperback, 2003)ISBN 0-671-72779-6ISBN 0-7043-3905-6ISBN 978-0-7538-1892-3 (paperback, United Kingdom, 2004)ISBN 9781453223970 (ebook, 2011)ISBN 9781780228716 (Tenth Anniversary Edition 2014)ISBN 978-1-4746-0725-4 (paperback, United Kingdom, 2017)See also [ edit ] Feminist literatureBlack feminismAfrican-American literatureNotes [ edit ] References [ edit ] ^ "National Book Awards '' 1983". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-01-26. (With essays by Anna Clark and Tarayi Jones from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.) ^ "The 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2000''2009". American Library Association. Archived from the original on November 2, 2019 . Retrieved April 22, 2017 . ^ "Alice Walker '' biography" . Retrieved April 12, 2012 . ^ "BBC '' The Big Read". BBC. April 2003, Retrieved August 23, 2017 ^ "1983 Pulitzer Prize Winners". www.pulitzer.org . Retrieved September 25, 2016 . ^ "April 18, 1983: Alice Walker Becomes the First Woman of Color to Win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction". The Nation. ISSN 0027-8378 . Retrieved September 25, 2016 . ^ a b c Walker, Alice (1982). The color purple : a novel (First ed.). New York. ISBN 0-15-119153-0. OCLC 8221433. ^ "1983 '' National Book Awards Fiction Winners". www.nbafictionblog.org . Retrieved September 24, 2016 . ^ "Some Letters Went to God". www.nytimes.com . Retrieved September 25, 2016 . ^ Office of Intellectual Freedom (March 26, 2013). "100 most frequently challenged books: 1990-1999". American Library Association . Retrieved June 18, 2021 . ^ Office of Intellectual Freedom (March 26, 2013). "Top 100 Banned/Challenged Books: 2000-2009". American Library Association . Retrieved June 18, 2021 . ^ Office of Intellectual Freedom (September 9, 2020). "Top 100 Most Banned and Challenged Books: 2010-2019". American Library Association . Retrieved June 18, 2021 . ^ Office of Intellectual Freedom (March 26, 2013). "Top 10 Most Challenged Books Lists". American Library Association . Retrieved June 18, 2021 . ^ admin (March 27, 2013). "100 most frequently challenged books by decade" . Retrieved September 25, 2016 . ^ admin (March 27, 2013). "Banned and/or Challenged Books from the Radcliffe Publishing Course Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century". Archived from the original on December 4, 2019 . Retrieved September 25, 2016 . ^ Bobo, Jacqueline (January 1, 1989). "Sifting Through the Controversy: Reading The Color Purple". Callaloo (39): 332''42. doi:10.2307/2931568. JSTOR 2931568. ^ Times, E. R. Shipp, Special To The New York (January 27, 1986). "BLACKS IN HEATED DEBATE OVER 'THE COLOR PURPLE ' ". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331 . Retrieved September 25, 2016 . ^ "100 'most inspiring' novels revealed by BBC Arts". BBC News. November 5, 2019 . Retrieved November 10, 2019 . The reveal kickstarts the BBC's year-long celebration of literature. ^ Rotten Tomatoes page for The Color Purple ^ Roger Ebert's review of The Color Purple ^ John Fleming. "Passion for 'Purple' has Local Roots". "Saint Petersburg Times". Dec. 12, 2005 ^ Sony Radio Academy Awards 2009: Dramas ^ Letter from Alice Walker to Publishers at Yediot Books ^ Jewish Press, Alan Dershowitz: Alice Walker's Bigotry, June 20, 2012. ^ AP, "Alice Walker rejects Israeli translation of book", June 20, 2012. Yahoo News Singh, Sonal, and Sushma Gupta. ''Celie's Emancipation in the Novel The Color Purple.'' International Transactions in Humanities and Social Sciences, vol. 2, no. 2, Dec. 2010, pp. 218''221.Humanities International Complete.
        Tahir, Ary S. ''Gender Violence in Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye and Alice Walker's The Color Purple.'' Journal of Language and Literature Education, no. 11, 2014, pp. 1''19. Literature Resource Center, doi:10.12973/jlle.11.243.
        External links [ edit ] Alice Walker discusses The Color Purple on the BBC's World Book ClubNew Georgia EncyclopediaPhotos of the first edition of The Color Purple"Alice Walker on 30th Anniv. of The Color Purple: Racism, Violence Against Women Are Global Issues", from Democracy Now! September 28, 2012.Awards for The Color Purple
      Flapper - Wikipedia
        Link to Article
        Archived Version
        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 15:18
        A flapper on board a ship (1929)
        Flappers were a generation of young Western women in the 1920s who wore short skirts (knee height was considered short during that time period), bobbed their hair, listened to jazz, and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered acceptable behavior. Flappers were seen as brash for wearing excessive makeup, drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes in public, driving automobiles, treating sex in a casual manner, and otherwise flouting social and sexual norms.[1] As automobiles became available, flappers gained freedom of movement and privacy.[2] Flappers are icons of the Roaring Twenties, the social, political turbulence and increased transatlantic cultural exchange that followed the end of World War I, as well as the export of American jazz culture to Europe. There was a reaction to this counterculture from more conservative people who belonged mostly to older generations. They claimed that the flappers' dresses were 'near nakedness', and that flappers were 'flippant', 'reckless', and unintelligent.
        Etymology [ edit ] The slang term "flapper" may derive from an earlier use in northern England to mean "teenage girl", referring to one whose hair is not yet put up and whose plaited pigtail "flapped" on her back,[3] or from an older word meaning "prostitute".[4] The slang word "flap" was used for a young prostitute as early as 1631.[5] By the 1890s, the word "flapper" was used in some localities as slang both for a very young prostitute,[6][page needed ][7] and, in a more general and less derogatory sense, of any lively mid-teenage girl.[8]
        The standard non-slang usage appeared in print as early as 1903 in England and 1904 in the United States, when novelist Desmond Coke used it in his college story of Oxford life, Sandford of Merton: "There's a stunning flapper".[9] In 1907 English actor George Graves explained it to Americans as theatrical slang for acrobatic young female stage performers.[10] The flapper was also known as a dancer, who danced like a bird'--flapping her arms while doing the Charleston move. This move became quite a competitive dance during this era.[11]
        By 1908, newspapers as serious as The Times used the term, although with careful explanation: "A 'flapper', we may explain, is a young lady who has not yet been promoted to long frocks and the wearing of her hair 'up'".[12] In April 1908, the fashion section of London's The Globe and Traveller contained a sketch entitled "The Dress of the Young Girl" with the following explanation:
        Americans, and those fortunate English folk whose money and status permit them to go in freely for slang terms ... call the subject of these lines the 'flapper.' The appropriateness of this term does not move me to such whole-hearted admiration of the amazing powers of enriching our language which the Americans modestly acknowledge they possess ..., [and] in fact, would scarcely merit the honour of a moment of my attention, but for the fact that I seek in vain for any other expression that is understood to signify that important young person, the maiden of some sixteen years.
        The sketch is of a girl in a frock with a long skirt, "which has the waistline quite high and semi-Empire, ... quite untrimmed, its plainness being relieved by a sash knotted carelessly around the skirt."[13]
        By November 1910, the word was popular enough for A. E. James to begin a series of stories in the London Magazine featuring the misadventures of a pretty fifteen-year-old girl and titled "Her Majesty the Flapper".[14] By 1911, a newspaper review indicates the mischievous and flirtatious "flapper" was an established stage-type.[15]
        By 1912, the London theatrical impresario John Tiller, defining the word in an interview he gave to The New York Times, described a "flapper" as belonging to a slightly older age group, a girl who has "just come out".[16] Tiller's use of the phrase "come out" means "to make a formal entry into 'society' on reaching womanhood".[17] In polite society at the time, a teenage girl who had not come out would still be classed as a child. She would be expected to keep a low profile on social occasions and ought not to be the object of male attention. Although the word was still largely understood as referring to high-spirited teenagers,[18] gradually in Britain it was being extended to describe any impetuous immature woman.[a] By late 1914, the British magazine Vanity Fair was reporting that the Flapper was beginning to disappear in England, being replaced by the so-called "Little Creatures."[20]
        A Times article on the problem of finding jobs for women made unemployed by the return of the male workforce was titled "The Flapper's Future".[21] Under this influence, the meaning of the term changed somewhat, to apply to "independent, pleasure-seeking, khaki-crazy young women".[7]
        In his lecture in February 1920 on Britain's surplus of young women caused by the loss of young men in war, Dr. R. Murray-Leslie criticized "the social butterfly type... the frivolous, scantily-clad, jazzing flapper, irresponsible and undisciplined, to whom a dance, a new hat, or a man with a car, were of more importance than the fate of nations".[22] In May of that year, Selznick Pictures released The Flapper a silent comedy film starring Olive Thomas. It was the first film in the United States to portray the "flapper" lifestyle. By that time, the term had taken on the full meaning of the flapper generation style and attitudes
        The use of the term coincided with a fashion among teenage girls in the United States in the early 1920s for wearing unbuckled galoshes,[23] and a widespread false etymology held that they were called "flappers" because they flapped when they walked, as they wore their overshoes or galoshes unfastened, showing that they defied convention in a manner similar to the 21st century fad for untied shoelaces.[24][page needed ][25][page needed ] Another suggestion to the origin of the term, in relation to fashion, comes from a 1920s fashion trend in which young women left their overcoat unbuttoned to allow it to flap back and forth as they walked, appearing more independent and freed from the tight, Victorian Era style clothing.[26]
        By the mid-1930s in Britain, although still occasionally used, the word "flapper" had become associated with the past. In 1936 a Times journalist grouped it with terms such as "blotto" as outdated slang: "[blotto] evokes a distant echo of glad rags and flappers ... It recalls a past which is not yet 'period'."[27]
        Influences [ edit ] "In all countries, the First World War weakened old orthodoxies and authorities, and, when it was over, neither government nor church nor school nor family had the power to regulate the lives of human beings as it had once done. One result of this was a profound change in manners and morals that made a freer and less restrained society. Women benefited from this as much as anyone else. Time-worn prescriptions concerning what was or was not proper behavior for them no longer possessed much credibility, and taboos about unaccompanied appearances in public places, or the use of liquor or tobacco, or even pre-marital sexual relationships had lost their force. ... [W]omen were no longer as vulnerable to the tyranny of society as they had been [before]."'-- Historian Gordon A. Craig[28]One cause of the change in young women's behavior was World War I which ended in November 1918. The death of large numbers of young men in the war, and the Spanish flu epidemic which struck in 1918 killing between 20''40 million people,[29] inspired in young people a feeling that life is short and could end at any moment. Therefore, young women wanted to spend their youth enjoying their life and freedom rather than just staying at home and waiting for a man to marry them.[30]
        Political changes were another cause of the flapper culture. World War I reduced the grip of the class system on both sides of the Atlantic, encouraging different classes to mingle and share their sense of freedom.[31] Women finally won the right to vote in the United States on August 26, 1920.[32] Women wanted to be men's social equals and were faced with the difficult realization of the larger goals of feminism: individuality, full political participation, economic independence, and 'sex rights'.[33] They wanted to be treated like men and go smoking and drinking.[34] In addition, many women had more opportunities in the workplace and had even taken traditionally male jobs such as doctors, lawyers, engineers and pilots.[35] The rise of consumerism also promoted the ideals of "fulfilment and freedom",[31] which encouraged women to think independently about their garments, careers, social activities.[35]
        Society changed quickly after World War I. For example, customs, technology, and manufacturing all moved quickly into the 20th century after the interruption of the war.[36] The rise of the automobile was an important factor in flapper culture, as cars meant a woman could come and go as she pleased, travel to speakeasies and other entertainment venues, and use the large vehicles of the day for their popular activity, petting parties.[37] Also, the economic boom allowed more people the time and money to play golf and tennis and to take vacations,[38] which required clothing adapted to these activities; the flapper's slender silhouette was very suitable for movement.[39]
        Evolution of the image [ edit ] The first appearance of the flapper style[b] in the United States came from the popular 1920 Frances Marion film, The Flapper, starring Olive Thomas.[41] Thomas starred in a similar role in 1917, though it was not until The Flapper that the term was used. In her final movies, she was seen as the flapper image.[42] Other actresses, such as Clara Bow, Louise Brooks, Colleen Moore and Joan Crawford would soon build their careers on the same image, achieving great popularity.[41]
        In the United States, popular contempt for Prohibition was a factor in the rise of the flapper. With legal saloons and cabarets closed, back alley speakeasies became prolific and popular. This discrepancy between the law-abiding, religion-based temperance movement and the actual ubiquitous consumption of alcohol led to widespread disdain for authority. Flapper independence was also a response to the Gibson girls of the 1890s.[44] Although that pre-war look does not resemble the flapper style, their independence may have led to the flapper wisecracking tenacity 30 years later.
        Woman depicted in typical flapper outfit in the cover art for
        The Plastic Age, 1924
        Writers in the United States such as F. Scott Fitzgerald and Anita Loos and illustrators such as Russell Patterson, John Held, Jr., Ethel Hays and Faith Burrows popularized the flapper look and lifestyle through their works, and flappers came to be seen as attractive, reckless, and independent. Among those who criticized the flapper craze was writer-critic Dorothy Parker, who penned "Flappers: A Hate Song" to poke fun at the fad. The secretary of labor denounced the "flippancy of the cigarette smoking, cocktail-drinking flapper". A Harvard psychologist reported that flappers had "the lowest degree of intelligence" and constituted "a hopeless problem for educators".
        Another writer, Lynne Frame, said in her book that a large number of scientists and health professionals have analyzed and reviewed the degree of femininity of flappers' appearance and behavior, given the "boyishness" of the flapper look and behavior. Some gynecologists gave the opinion that women were less "marriageable" if they were less "feminine", as the husband would be unhappy in his marriage. In Frame's book, she also wrote that the appearance of flappers, like the short hair and short dress, distracted attention from feminine curves to the legs and body. These attributes were not only a fashion trend but also the expression of a blurring of gender roles.[46]
        The Gibson Girl [ edit ] The Gibson Girl was one of the origins of the flapper. The invention of Charles Dana Gibson, the Gibson Girl changed the fashion, patterns, and lifestyles of the 1920s; these were much more progressive than the traditions of women's styles in the past. Before the Gibson Girl movement, women's voices as a group were infrequently heard. While some may see the Gibson Girl as just a fashion statement, it was much more broadly influential than that. "She depicted the modern woman, known popularly as the 'new woman', at a time when more women gained independence, began to work outside the home, and sought the right to vote and other rights."[47] Gibson's illustrations showed feminist women of all kinds who worried more about themselves than about pleasing the men in their lives. It was the first time a woman could actually concentrate on her own dreams and goals. The Gibson Girl also exemplified the importance of intelligence and learning rather than catering to men's needs
        According to a website on Kate Chopin, "The Gibson Girl influenced society in the early 1900s much like Barbie influenced society of the late 1900s. The Gibson Girl crossed many societal lines opening the way for women to participate in things they had never done before. She, like Barbie, portrayed women as strong individuals who could play sports while maintaining perfectly coiffed hair and dress. She was criticized by many, much like Barbie, for creating an unrealistic ideal of what women should look like: perfect proportions and long flowing hair. Despite the criticism she was a trend setter, a model for women in both dress and action, just like Barbie."[48]
        The fashion of the Gibson Girl allowed them a much more active lifestyle then previously, in both work and recreation. "Skirts were long and flared, and dresses were tailored with high necks and close-fitting sleeves. The style was considered masculine, and this was sometimes emphasized by wearing a necktie. Though women still wore the restrictive undergarments known as corsets, a new health corset came into style that was said to be better for the spine than earlier corsets. An S-shaped figure became trendy, with a large bust and large hips, separated by a tiny, corseted waist. These styles, worn with confidence and poise by modern women. ... She might be pictured at a desk in a tailored shirtwaist or at a tennis party in an informal sports dress. She wore her long hair upswept in an elaborate mass of curls, perhaps topped by a simple straw hat. Though she was capable and independent, the Gibson girl was always beautiful and elegant."[47] According to the Library of Congress, "Gibson's meticulous depiction of their hats accentuates the Gibson Girls' stylish attire and visually reinforces the impression of height, leading the eye to the mountains. ... Gibson shows off the classic Gibson Girl as a figure who embraced outdoor physical activities."[49]
        The Gibson Girl was uniquely American compared to European standards of style. She was an ideal: youthful, feminist, strong and a truly modern woman. Gibson emphasized that any women can be represented as a Gibson Girl, both those in the middle and the upper class. Minnie Clark, known as "the original Gibson Girl", was a model for Gibson and could portray any type of women needed for his illustration. Gibson drew with characteristic grace women of all races and classes so that any woman could feel that they, too, could be a graceful Gibson
        Magazines [ edit ] The Flapper Magazine inner page
        In 1922, a small-circulation magazine '' The Flapper, located in Chicago '' celebrated the flapper's appeal. On the opening page of its first issue, it proudly declared flappers' break with traditional values. Also, flappers defended them by contrasting themselves with earlier generations of women whom they called "clinging vines". They mocked the confining fashions and demure passivity of older women and reveled in their own freedom. They did not even acknowledge that the previous generation of female activists had made the flappers' freedom possible.[50]
        In the 1920s, new magazines appealed to young German women with a sensuous image and advertisements for the appropriate clothes and accessories they would want to purchase. The glossy pages of Die Dame and Das Blatt der Hausfrau displayed the "Girl"'--the flapper. She was young and fashionable, financially independent, and was an eager consumer of the latest fashions. The magazines kept her up to date on fashion, arts, sports, and modern technology such as automobiles and telephones.[51]
        Behavior [ edit ] Although many young women in the 1920s saw flappers as the symbol of a brighter future, some also questioned the flappers' more extreme behavior. Therefore, in 1923, the magazine began asking for true stories from its readers for a new column called "Confessions of a Flapper". Some of these were lighthearted stories of girls getting the better of those who underestimated them, but others described girls betraying their own standards of behavior in order to live up to the image of flappers. There were several examples: a newlywed confessed to having cheated on her husband, a college student described being told by a boyfriend that she was not "the marrying kind" because of the sexual liberties she had permitted him, and a minister's daughter recounted the humiliation of being caught in the lie of pretending she was older and more sophisticated than she was. Many readers thought that flappers had gone too far in their quest for adventure. One 23-year-old "ex-vamp" declared: "In my opinion, the average flappers from 15 to 19 were brainless, inconsiderate of others, and easy to get into serious trouble."[50]
        So, among the readers of The Flapper, parts of them were celebrated for flappers' spirit and appropriation of male privilege, while parts of them acknowledged the dangers of emulating flappers too faithfully, with some even confessing to violating their own codes of ethics so as to live up to all the hype.[50]
        American banks and "flapper" employees [ edit ] According to a report in 1922, some banks across the United States started to regulate the dress and deportment of young female employees who were considered to be "flappers". It began with a complaint of a mother in New Jersey who felt dissatisfied because her son did business only with a young female employee, whom she considered illegally attractive. The incident was duly reported to the officials of the bank, and rules adopted regarding requirements in dress for female employees. Those rules included that the dress should not have a pattern, it should be bought from a specific store, it must be worn in either black, blue or brown, its sleeves must not be shortened above the elbow, and its hem must not be worn higher than 12 inches from the ground. After that, the anti-flapper code soon spread to the Federal Reserve, where female employees were firmly told that there was no time for them to beautify themselves during office hours.[31]
        Image of youth [ edit ] The flapper stands as one of the more enduring images of youth and new women in the 20th century and is viewed by modern-day Americans as something of a cultural heroine. However, back in the 1920s, many Americans regarded flappers as threatening to conventional society, representing a new moral order. Although most of them were the daughters of the middle class, they flouted middle-class values. Lots of women in the United States were drawn to the idea of being a flapper. There were rival organizations of flappers- the National Flapper Flock and the Royal Order of the Flapper.[52] Flappers shrugged off their chaperones, danced suggestively, and openly flirted with boys. "Flappers prized style over substance, novelty over tradition, and pleasure over virtue."[50] Ruth Gillettes, a 1920s singer, had a song titled "Oh Say! Can I See You Tonight?" which expresses the new behavior of girls in the 1920s. Before the 1920s, for a woman to call a man to suggest a date would be impossible. However, in the 1920s, many girls seemed to play a leading role in relationships, actively asking boys out or even coming to their homes.[53]
        Flappers' behavior was considered outlandish at the time and redefined women's roles. In the English media, they were stereotyped as pleasure-loving, reckless and prone to defying convention by initiating sexual relationships.[54] Some[55] have suggested that the flapper concept as a stage of life particular to young women was imported to England from Germany, where it originated "as a sexual reaction against the over-fed, under-exercised monumental woman, and as a compromise between pederasty and normal sex".[55] In Germany, teenage girls were called "Backfisch", which meant a young fish not yet big enough to be sold in the market.[56][57] Although the concept of "Backfisch" was known in England by the late 1880s, the term was understood to mean a very demure social type[58] unlike the flapper, who was typically rebellious and defiant of convention. The evolving image of flappers was of independent young women who went by night to jazz clubs such as those in Harlem, which were viewed as erotic and dangerous, where they danced provocatively, smoked cigarettes and dated freely, perhaps indiscriminately. They were active, sporting, rode bicycles, drove cars, and openly drank alcohol, a defiant act in the American period of Prohibition.[59] With time, came the development of dance styles such as the Charleston, the Shimmy, the Bunny Hug, and the Black Bottom, which were considered shocking, but were a symbolic badge of the flapper's rejection of traditional standards.[60]
        Overturning of Victorian roles [ edit ] Billie Dove on
        "Not for Old Fogies". The Flapper (cover). November 1922. Flappers also began working outside the home and challenging women's traditional societal roles and the monolithic historical idea of women being powerless throughout social history.[61]
        They were considered a significant challenge to traditional Victorian gender roles, devotion to plain-living, hard work and religion. Increasingly, women discarded old, rigid ideas about roles and embraced consumerism and personal choice, and were often described in terms of representing a "culture war" of old versus new. Flappers also advocated voting and women's rights.
        In this manner, flappers were a result of larger social changes '' women were able to vote in the United States in 1920, and religious society had been rocked by the Scopes trial.[62]
        For all the concern about women stepping out of their traditional roles, however, many flappers were not engaged in politics. In fact, older suffragettes, who fought for the right for women to vote, viewed flappers as vapid and in some ways unworthy of the enfranchisement they had worked so hard to win.[63] Dorothy Dunbar Bromley, a noted liberal writer at the time, summed up this dichotomy by describing flappers as "truly modern", "New Style" feminists who "admit that a full life calls for marriage and children" and also "are moved by an inescapable inner compulsion to be individuals in their own right".
        Petting parties [ edit ] "Petting" ("making out" or foreplay) became more common than in the Victorian era, for example, with the rise in popularity of "petting parties".[65][66] At these parties, promiscuity became more commonplace, breaking from the traditions of monogamy or courtship with their expectations of eventual marriage.[67] This was typical on college campuses, where young people "spent a great deal of unsupervised time in mixed company".[68][69][70]
        Carolyn Van Wyck wrote a column for Photoplay, an upmarket magazine that featured articles on pop culture, advice on fashion, and even articles on helping readers channel their inner celebrity. In March 1926 an anonymous young woman wrote in describing petting as a problem, explaining "The boys all seem to do it and don't seem to come back if you don't do it also. We girls are at our wits' end to know what to do. ... I'm sure that I don't want to marry anyone who is too slow to want to pet. But I want to discover what is right. Please help me." Van Wyck sympathized with the problem the writer faced and added, "It seems to me much better to be known as a flat tire and keep romance in one's mind than to be called a hot date and have fear in one's heart."[71]
        In the 1950s, Life magazine depicted petting parties as "that famed and shocking institution of the '20s", and commenting on the 'Kinsey Report', said that they have been "very much with us ever since".[72] In the Kinsey Report of 1950, there was an indicated increase in premarital intercourse for the generation of the 1920s. Kinsey found that of women born before 1900, 14 percent acknowledged premarital sex before the age of 25, while those born after 1900 were two and a half times more likely (36 percent) to have premarital intercourse and experience an orgasm.[73]
        Slang [ edit ] Flappers were associated with the use of a number of slang words, including "junk", "necker", "heavy petting", and "necking parties",[74]although these words existed before the 1920s.[75] Flappers also used the word "jazz" in the sense of anything exciting or fun. Their language sometimes reflected their feelings about dating, marriage and drinking habits: "I have to see a man about a dog" at this period often meant going to buy whiskey; and a "handcuff" or "manacle" was an engagement or wedding ring. Moreover, flappers invented slang terms like "hush money," which meant the allowance from a father or "dropping the pilot," which meant getting a divorce.[76] Also reflective of their preoccupations were phrases to express approval, such as "That's so Jake",[c] (okay); "That's the bee's knees", (a superb person); "Cake-eater," (a ladies' man); and the popular: "the cat's meow," (anything wonderful).[78]
        There were two more slangs that reflected flapper's behaviors or lifestyles, which were "treating" and "charity girls". "Treating" was a culture or habit mainly for the working-class flappers. Although they earned money from work, they still wanted to earn some more for them to live. Women were willingly invited to dance, for drinks, for entrances up to jewelry and clothing. For the "return service", women granted any kind of erotic or sexual interaction from flirting to sexual intercourse. However, this practice was easily mistaken for prostitution. So, some people would call them "charity girls" to differentiate them from prostitutes as the girls claimed that they did not accept money in their sexual encounters with men.[79]
        Appearance [ edit ] In addition to their irreverent behavior, flappers were known for their style, which largely emerged as a result of French fashions,[80] especially those pioneered by Coco Chanel, the effect on dress of the rapid spread of American jazz, and the popularization of dancing that accompanied it.[81] Called gar§onne in French ("boy" with a feminine suffix), flapper style made girls look young and boyish: short hair, flattened breasts, and straight waists accentuated it. By at least 1913, the association between slim adolescence and a certain characteristic look became fixed in the public's mind. Lillian Nordica, commenting on New York fashions that year, referred to
        a thin little flapper of a girl donning a skirt in which she can hardly take a step, extinguishing all but her little white teeth with a dumpy bucket of a hat, and tripping down Fifth Avenue.[82]
        At this early date, it seems that the style associated with a flapper already included the boyish physique[83] and close-fitting hat, but a hobble skirt rather than one with a high hemline.[80]
        Although the appearance typically associated now with flappers (straight waists, short hair and a hemline above the knee) did not fully emerge until about1926,[84] there was an early association in the public mind between unconventional appearance, outrageous behavior, and the word "flapper". A report in The Times of a 1915 Christmas entertainment for troops stationed in France described a soldier in drag burlesquing feminine flirtatiousness while wearing "short skirts, a hat of Parisian type[85] and flapper-like hair".[86]
        Despite the scandal flappers generated, their look became fashionable in a toned-down form among respectable older women.[87] Significantly, the flappers removed the corset from female fashion, raised skirt and gown hemlines, and popularized short hair for women. Among actresses closely identified with the style were Tallulah Bankhead,[88] Olive Borden, Clara Bow, Louise Brooks, Joan Crawford, Bebe Daniels, Billie Dove, Leatrice Joy, Helen Kane, Laura La Plante, Dorothy Mackaill, Colleen Moore, Norma Shearer, Norma Talmadge, Olive Thomas, and Alice White.
        Beginning in the early 1920s, flappers began appearing in newspaper comic strips; Blondie Boopadoop and Fritzi Ritz '' later depicted more domestically, as the wife of Dagwood Bumstead and aunt of Nancy, respectively '' were introduced as flappers.[89]
        Apparel [ edit ] "Where there's smoke there's fire" by
        Russell Patterson, showing a fashionably dressed flapper in the 1920s.
        Flapper dresses were straight and loose, leaving the arms bare (sometimes no straps at all) and dropping the waistline to the hips. Silk or rayon stockings were held up by garters. Skirts rose to just below the knee by 1927, allowing flashes of leg to be seen when a girl danced or walked through a breeze, although the way they danced made any long loose skirt flap up to show their legs. To enhance the view, some flappers applied rouge to their knees.[90][91] Popular dress styles included the Robe de style. High heels also came into vogue at the time, reaching 2''3 inches (5''8 cm) high.[80] Favored shoe styles were Mary Janes and T-straps in classic black, gold, silver, or nude shades.[92]
        Lingerie [ edit ] Flappers did away with corsets and pantaloons in favor of "step-in" panties. Without the old restrictive corsets, flappers wore simple bust bodices to restrain their chest when dancing. They also wore new, softer and suppler corsets that reached to their hips, smoothing the whole frame, giving women a straight up and down appearance as opposed to the old corsets that slenderized the waist and accented the hips and bust.[80]
        The lack of curves of a corset promoted a boyish look. Adding an even more boyish look, the Symington Side Lacer was invented and became a popular essential as an everyday bra. This type of bra was made to pull in the back to flatten the chest.[80] Other women envied flappers for their flat chests and bought the Symington Side Lacer to enhance the same look; large breasts were commonly regarded as a trait of unsophistication. Hence, flat chests became appealing to women, although flappers were the most common to wear such bras.
        Hair and accessories [ edit ] Boyish cuts were in vogue and released the weight of the tradition of women being required to grow their hair long, through popular cuts such as the bob cut, Eton crop, and shingle bob. Finger waving was used as a means of styling. Hats were still required wear and popular styles included the newsboy cap and cloche hat.
        Jewelry usually consisted of art deco pieces, especially many layers of beaded necklaces. Pins, rings, and brooches came into style. Horn-rimmed glasses were also popular.
        Cosmetics [ edit ] As far back as the 1890s, French actress Polaire pioneered a look which included short, disheveled hair, emphatic mouth and huge eyes heavily outlined in kohl.[93][94] The evolving flapper look required "heavy makeup" in comparison to what had previously been acceptable outside of professional usage in the theater. With the invention of the metal lipstick container as well as compact mirrors, bee stung lips came into vogue. Dark eyes, especially kohl-rimmed, were the style. Blush came into vogue now that it was no longer a messy application process. Women shaped their eyebrows needle-thin and penciled them in dark, emulating such actresses as Clara Bow.[95][96]
        Originally, pale skin was considered most attractive. However, tanned skin became increasingly popular after Coco Chanel showed off a tan after a holiday '' it suggested a life of leisure, without the onerous need to work. Women wanted to look fit, sporty, and, above all, healthy.
        Semiotics of the flapper [ edit ] Being liberated from restrictive dress, from laces that interfered with breathing, and from hoops that needed managing suggested liberation of another sort. The new-found freedom to breathe and walk encouraged movement out of the house, and the flapper took full advantage.[97] The flapper was an extreme manifestation of changes in the lifestyles of American women made visible through dress.[98]
        Changes in fashion were interpreted as signs of deeper changes in the American feminine ideal.[99] The short skirt and bobbed hair were likely to be used as a symbol of emancipation.[100] Signs of the moral revolution consisted of premarital sex, birth control, drinking, and contempt for older values. Before the War, a lady did not set foot in a saloon; after the War a woman, though no more "a lady", entered a speakeasy as casually as she would go into a railroad station. Women had started swearing and smoking publicly, using contraceptives, raising their skirts above the knee and rolling their hose below it. Women were now competing with men in the business world and obtaining financial independence and, therefore, other kinds of independence from men.[98]
        The New Woman was pushing the boundaries of gender roles, representing sexual and economic freedom. She cut her hair short and took to loose-fitting clothing and low cut dresses. No longer restrained by a tight waist and long trailing skirts, the modern woman of the 1920s was an independent thinker, who no longer followed the conventions of those before her.[97] The flapper was an example of the prevailing conceptions of women and their roles during the Roaring 1920s. The flappers' ideal was motion with characteristics of intensity, energy, and volatility. She refused the traditional moral code. Modesty, chastity, morality, and traditional concepts of masculinity and femininity were seemingly ignored. The flapper was making an appeal to authority and was being attached to the impending "demoralization" of the country.[98]
        The Victorian American conception of sexuality and other roles of men and women in society and to one another were being challenged. Modern clothing was lighter and more flexible, better suiting the modern woman such as the flapper who wanted to engage in active sport. Women were now becoming more assertive and less willing to keep the home fires burning. The flappers' costume was seen as sexual and raised deeper questions of the behavior and values it symbolized.[98]
        End of the flapper era [ edit ] The flapper lifestyle and look disappeared and the roaring '20s era of glitz and glamour came to an end in America after the Wall Street Crash of 1929[101]Unable to afford the latest trends and lifestyle, the once-vibrant flapper women returned to their dropped hemlines, and the flapper dress disappeared. A sudden serious tone washed over the public with the appearance of the Great Depression. The high-spirited attitude and hedonism were less acceptable during the economic hardships of the 1930s. When hemlines began to rise again, numerous states took action, making laws that restricted women to wear skirts with hemlines no shorter than three inches above the ankle. The ever-popular bobbed haircut was the cause for some women being fired from their jobs.[102][better source needed ]
        Transitioning into the 1930s was no easy task. Campaigns such as the "Make Do and Mend" slogan were becoming prevalent to ensure there was no overconsumption throughout society.[103]Fabric choices were among the many items to be cut back during this poverty-stricken time. Artificial fabrics were used instead of elegant fabrics such as silk, which were so popular in the early 1900s. No longer were party dresses adorned with decorative embellishments or made brightly colored. Instead, women headed to work to take over roles of men at war. The physically demanding jobs called for the creation and social acceptance of women's pants in society.
        See also [ edit ] Betty BoopHawksian womanJazz AgeModern girl1929 United Kingdom general election, "the flapper election"Zelda FitzgeraldReferences [ edit ] Informational notes
        ^ In a 1913 letter a man addressed his 21-year-old girlfriend as his "flapper".[19] ^ The word itself was introduced earlier.[10][40] ^ First occurring as American criminal slang before 1914.[77] Citations
        ^ Rosenberg, Jennifer. "Flappers in the Roaring Twenties". About.com . Retrieved April 4, 2010 . ^ Editors, History com. "Flappers". HISTORY . Retrieved April 20, 2020 . CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link) ^ Evans, Ivan H. Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (rev. ed.) New York: Harper & Row, 1981 ISBN 0-06-014903-5 ^ "flapper". Online Etymology Dictionary. April 26, 2007. . ^ Mabbe, James. Celestina IX. 110 "Fall to your flap, my Masters, kisse and clip"; 112 "Come hither, you foule flappes." ^ Barrere; Leland (1889). Dictionary of Slang. Flippers, flappers, very young girls trained to vice . ^ a b Savage, Jon. Teenage: The Creation of Youth Culture. New York: Viking, 2007. p. 202. ISBN 978-0-670-03837-4 ^ Lowsley, Barzillai. A glossary of Berkshire words and phrases 1888 (E.D.S.): "Vlapper, .. applied in joke to a girl of the bread-and-butter age." ^ Oxford English Dictionary. 1989. [full citation needed ] ^ a b "The Comedy Old Man and His Troubles". The New York Times (interview with English comedy actor George Graves). February 3, 1907. What are 'flappers'? Why, they are the young girls with their hair still hanging down their backs. They are the sort that can climb up ropes hand over hand and pose at the top. ^ The Jazz Age. The 20s. Alexandria, Virginia.: Editors of the Time-Life Books. 1997. p. 38. ^ The Times (38574). February 20, 1908. page 15, col F. [full citation needed ] ^ "The Dress of the Young Girl". The Globe and Traveller. April 11, 1908. ^ James, A. E. "Her Majesty the Flapper" Archived December 4, 2009, at the Wayback Machine. London Magazine (November, 1910) ^ "Review of the 1911 comedy Lady Patricia". The Times (39540). March 23, 1911. p 10, col C. Now the 'flapper' is Miss Clare Lesley, the Dean's tomboy daughter... In the play a mature married couple, Patricia and Michael, vainly pursue slang-talking teenagers Billy and Clare, and so "Clare, out of the charity of youth for enamoured maturity, indulges Michael with a little mild flirtation" before at the end finding real love with Billy, who is her own age. The actress playing the flapper is characterized as "full of youth and 'go'". ^ "Some facts about the ballet". The New York Times. March 31, 1912. Mr. Tiller explained the difference between a "pony" and a "flapper". A pony, he said, is a small dancer who may be of any age. A flapper is a girl who has just "come out". She is at an awkward age, neither a child nor a woman, and she is just as likely to develop into a show girl as a pony. ^ Oxford English Dictionary ^ The Times (40576). July 15, 1914. page 1, col B. The father of a young lady, aged 15 '' a typical "FLAPPER" '' with all the self assurance of a woman of 30 would be grateful for the recommendation of a seminary (not a convent) where she might be placed for a year or two with the object of taming her. It is not EDUCATION she requires, she has too much of that already... [full citation needed ] ^ "£600 Damages For Breach of Promise". The Times (40344). October 16, 1913. p 15, col D. I cannot bear to think of my flapper without an engagement ring. ^ Anonymous (December 1914) "The Melancholy Passing of the Flapper" Vanity Fair ^ The Times (42232). October 16, 1919. page 7, col B. ^ The Times (42326). February 5, 1920. page 9, col A. . ^ "Flappers flaunt fads in footwear" 'The New York Times' (January 29, 1922). The article alleges the origin of the fashion was a Douglas Fairbanks costume in the film The Three Musketeers, in which he wore his boot-tops turned down. ^ Basinger, Jeanne (2000). Silent Stars. Wesleyan. . ^ Strong, Marion in Brady, Kathleen (2001). Lucille: The life of Lucille Ball. Billboard. The more noise the buckles made, the better they flapped, that's why we were called flappers . ^ Corrigan, Jim. The 1920s Decade in photos: The Roaring Twenties. Berkeley Heights, New Jersey: Enslow Publishers, Inc, 2009, p. 19 ^ The Times (London, England): "Delivering Drunkards", December 2, 1936, p. 15 ^ Craig, Gordon A. (1991) The Germans New York: Merdian. p.161. ISBN 9780452010857 ^ Sagert, Kelly Boyer (2010). Flappers: A Guide to an American Subculture . Santa Barbara CA: Greenwood Press. pp. 1. ISBN 9780313376900. ^ Cellania, M. (2013, March 25). The Rise of the Flapper - Sociological Images. Retrieved April 26, 2016, from https://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2013/03/25/guest-post-the-rise-of-the-flapper/ ^ a b c McGlinchey, S. (2014) "History of Women's Fashion: 1920 to 1929" Glamour Daze Retrieved April 12, 2016. ^ Langley, S. (2005) "Jazz" in Roaring '20s Fashions. Atglen, Pennsylvania: Schiffer Publishing. p.16 ISBN 0764323199 ^ Latham, Angela J. (2000). Posing a Threat: Flappers, Chorus Girls, and other Brazen Performers of the American 1920s. Hanover NH: University Press of New England. p. 9. ISBN 9780819564016. ^ Langley, S. (2005) "Jazz" in Roaring '20s Fashions. Atglen, Pennsylvania: Schiffer Publishing. p.18 ISBN 0764323199 ^ a b Langley, S. (2005) "Jazz" in Roaring '20s Fashions. Atglen, Pennsylvania: Schiffer Publishing. p.17 ISBN 0764323199 ^ Boland, J. (April 15, 2012) "1920s Fashion & Music". Retrieved April 12, 2016. ^ Cellania, M. (March 25, 2013) 6, "The Rise of the Flapper - Sociological Images". Retrieved April 26, 2016. ^ Bramlett, L. A. (2010) "Vintage Sportswear" Fuzzylizzie Vintage Retrieved April 12, 2016. ^ Stevenson, N. J. (2012) Fashion: A visual history from regency & romance to retro & revolution: A complete illustrated chronology of fashion from the 1800s to the present day (1st ed.). New York: The Ivy Press Limited. p.92-93 ^ Staff (February 24, 1910). New Brunswick Times. And over in England, as I learned, they call a girl of about fifteen a "flapper."... ^ a b "Olive Thomas". Memories of Olive. Assumption. Archived from the original on April 12, 2013. . ^ Long, Bruce (ed.). "Taylorology: A Continuing Exploration of the Life and Death of William Desmond Taylor". Arizona State University. . ^ Conor, Liz. The Spectacular Modern Woman: Feminine Visibility in The 1920s 2004. p. 301 ^ Reinsch, O. (2013). "Gender and Consumerism" [permanent dead link ] Gender Forum Retrieved April 26, 2016. ^ a b Staff (ndg) "The Gibson Girl" Encyclopedia of Fashion website. Retrieved October 11, 2016. ^ Chopin, Kate (ndg) "The Gibson Girl" Retrieved October 25, 2016 ^ Staff (ndg) "The Gibson Girl as the 'New Woman'" The Gibson Girl's America: Drawings by Charles Dana Gibson Library of Congress website ^ a b c d Ferentinos, S. (n.d.). Not for Old Fogies: The Flapper. Retrieved May 18, 2016, from http://www.ultimatehistoryproject.com/flapper.html ^ Nina Sylvester, "Before Cosmopolitan: The Girl in German women's magazines in the 1920s". Journalism Studies 8#4 (2007): 550''54. ^ Dalzell, Tom (2010). Flappers 2 Rappers. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications Inc. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-486-47587-5. ^ Langley, S. (2006). Roaring '20s fashions: Deco. Atglen, PA: Schiffer Publishing, p. 16 ^ Praga, Mrs. Alfred (July 29, 1917). " " Sporting" girls and the risks they run. An open letter to "The Flappers" of England". The Weekly Dispatch. p. 7. My dear "Flappers" '' I wonder if any of you in your gay youthfulness ever realise what a lot of harm you are doing to your future happiness by the way you sometimes cheapen yourselves in the eyes of your men "pals", as you love to call them ... The article goes on to describe flappers haunting public venues in order to "get off" with men. ^ a b Graves, Robert; Hodge, Alan (1994). The Long Week End: a Social History of Great Britain, 1918''1939. pp. 33''34. . ^ Backfisch. In: Sigi Kube: Wie kommt die Katze in den Sack und was weiŸ der Kuckuck davon?: Tierische Redewendungen und ihre Bedeutung. Heyne, 2011, ISBN 978-3-641-05361-1 (German) ^ Staff (February 24, 1910). New Brunswick Times. ... a typical German girl of the well to do class between the ages of fifteen and seventeen. Before she gets to be fifteen she is simply a 'kid' as we say in this country. But for those two years she is a backfisch pure and simple. The article implies the girl is so designated to prevent someone no longer a child attempting to assume the airs of an adult woman: "These German frauleins dare not do so, because they know they are mere backfisches." The article concludes "And over in England, as I learned, they call a girl of about fifteen a 'flapper'. If I were still but fifteen I am sure I would prefer being a backfisch." ^ Pall Mall Gazette. 3 (2). August 29, 1891. Let us introduce the word 'Backfisch', for we have the Backfisch always with us. She ranges from fifteen to eighteen years of age, keeps a diary, climbs trees secretly, blushes on the smallest provocation, and has no conversation. , in the Oxford English Dictionary (2nd ed.). 1989. [full citation needed ] ^ President of the League of American Pen Women, Mrs William Atherton du Puy (October 15, 1921). "Let Girls Smoke, Mrs Dupuy's Plea". The New York Times. Yes, girls do smoke, and there is no harm if they don't go to excess. It is not like the rush of girls to the caf(C)s to drink which happened twenty years ago. It was that which brought about prohibition. . ^ Dumenil (1995) ^ Latham, Angela J. (2000). Posing a Threat: Flappers, Chorus Girls, and other Brazen Performers of the American 1920s. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England. pp. 7''8. ISBN 9780819564016. ^ Zeitz, 2007. "Here was where the modern culture could prove threatening to the Victorians. The ethos of the consumer market glorified not only self-indulgence and satisfaction, but also personal liberty and choice. It invited relativism in all matters ranging from color schemes and bath soap to religion, politics, sex and morality." ^ Zeitz, 2007. "Others argued, though, that flappers' laissez-faire attitude was simply a natural progression of feminine liberation, the right having already been won."; p.107: "T[he Jazz Age flapper ... [was] [d]isengaged from politics..." ^ Weeks, Linton (June 26, 2015). "When 'Petting Parties' Scandalized The Nation". NPR . Retrieved December 18, 2020 . ^ Staff (February 17, 1922). "Mothers Complain that Modern Girls 'Vamp' Their Sons at Petting Parties". The New York Times. .An earlier article in the same newspaper rebutted an attack on the behaviour of American girls made recently in the Cosmopolitan by Elinor Glyn. It admitted the existence of petting parties but considered the activities were no worse than those which had gone on in earlier times under the guise of "kissing games", adding that tales of what occurred at such events were likely to be exaggerated by an older generation influenced by traditional misogynyDupuy, Mrs William Atherton (October 15, 1921). "Let Girls Smoke, Mrs. Dupuy's Plea; Penwomen's President Rises in Defense of Young Thing Who 'Parks Corsets' Before Dance. MRS.GLYN WRONG, SHE SAYS Declares Short-Skirt Girl of Today Who Goes to "Petting Parties" Is All She Should Be". The New York Times. . ^ McArthur, Judith N; Smith, Harold L (2010). Texas Through Women's Eyes: The Twentieth-Century Experience. pp. 104''05. ISBN 9780292778351. The spirit of the petting party is light and frivolous. Its object is not marriage '' only a momentary thrill. It completely gives the lie to those sweet, old phrases, "the only man" and "the only girl". For where there used to be only one girl there may be a score of them now. ^ Drowne, Kathleen Morgan; Huber, Patrick (2004). The 1920s. p. 45. ISBN 9780313320132. ^ Nelson, Lawrence J (2003). Rumors of Indiscretion. p. 39. ISBN 9780826262905. . ^ Bragdon, Claude (2007). Delphic Woman. pp. 45''46. ISBN 9781596054301. . ^ Dubois, Ellen Carol; Dumenil, Lynn (2012). Through Women's Eyes (Third ed.). Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin's. p. 561. ^ Havemann, Ernest. "The Kinsey Report on Women" Life magazine (August 24, 1953) ^ Duenil, Lynn (1995). The Modern Temper:American Culture and Society in the 1920s. New York, NY: Hill and Wang. p. 136. ^ "Shifters No Longer Appeal to Slackers". The New York Times. March 26, 1922. The epithets she has evolved from her own lexicon are "junk", "necker" and "heavy necker". "Junk" is anything she considers unimportant or unworthy of consideration. A "necker" is a "petter" who puts her arms around a boy's neck. A "heavy necker" is a "petter" who hangs heavily on said neck. "Necking parties" have superseded "petting parties. . ^ Oxford English Dictionary, online ed., March 2012. ^ November 5; 2019. "Flapper Slang: Talk the 1920s talk". KCTS 9 . Retrieved October 13, 2020 . CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) ^ Jackson, Louis E; Hellyer, CR (1914). A dictionary of criminal slang. in Oxford English Dictionary (online ed.). March 2012. .[full citation needed ] ^ Editors of Time-Life (1997). The Jazz Age: The 20s. Alexandria, Virginia.: Time-Life Books. pp. 32''33. CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link) ^ Reinsch, O. (2013). Gender and Consumerism. Retrieved April 26, 2016, from "Archived copy". Archived from the original on May 3, 2016 . Retrieved April 21, 2016 . CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) ^ a b c d e Kemper, Rachel (December 1977). History of Costume . New York: WW Norton & Co. ISBN 978-0-88225-137-0. ^ "The Short Skirt Misconception of the Twenties". Flapper fashion 1920s. Fashion era. July 24, 2018. Shortness is a popular misconception reinforced by the availability of moving film of the Charleston dance which shows very visible knees and legs on the dancing flappers. ^ "Mme Nordica Buys No Paris Gowns". The New York Times. January 1, 1913. . ^ "Mme Nordica Buys No Paris Gowns". The New York Times. January 1, 1913. ...when a lady of uncertain age and very certain development attempts the same little costume because it looks well on the thin little girl, well '' " And Mme. Nordica left the result to the interviewer's imagination. ^ "Flapper fashion 1920s". Evolution of the flapper fashion. Fashion era. July 24, 2018. . ^ The Times. December 23, 1915. p. 11. ...the jaunty little toque ^ "Pantomime At The Front, Soldier "Heroines " ". The Times (41050). December 30, 1915. p 7, col E. There was, for instance, a Maid Marian in the cast, who was described as a "dainty dam'sell" because she was a sergeant. There was something ridiculously fascinating about that sergeant, for he was in blue short skirts, a hat of Parisian type and flapper-like hair; and when she was instructing Ferdinand, a Bad Lad... in the use of the "glad eye", the great audience shouted with laughter. ^ Smith, Merril D. (2014). Cultural Encyclopedia of the Breast. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 114. ISBN 9780759123328. ^ Hughes, Kathryn. "Flappers: Six Women of a Dangerous Generation by Judith Mackrell '' review" The Guardian (June 1, 2013) ^ "Fritzi Ritz Before Bushmiller: She's Come a Long Way, Baby!". Hogan's Alley. September 22, 2017. Archived from the original on May 23, 2013 . Retrieved June 11, 2013 . ^ Lowry, Helen Bullitt. "On the Knees of Our College Girls" The New York Times (February 2, 1922) ^ Bergstein, Rachelle. Women From the Ankle Down: The Story of Shoes and How They Define Us New York: HarperCollins, 2012. ISBN 0-06-209707-5. ^ "Gatsby Party - Your Definitive Fashion Guide". picVpic-Fashion101. August 6, 2015 . Retrieved January 13, 2016 . ^ Jean Lorrain (1936). La Ville Empoisonn(C)e. Paris: Jean Cres. p. 279. ...the great voracious mouth, the immense black eyes, ringed, bruised, discolored, the incandescence of her pupils, the bewildered nocturnal hair... ^ "Commons". Polaire (category). Wikimedia. . ^ "A Brief History of 1920s Makeuop" Glamour Daze ^ Valenti, Lauren (April 10, 2014) "The History of Women and Their Eyebrows" Marie Claire ^ a b Kriebl, Karen J (1998). From bloomers to flappers: the American women's dress reform movement, 1840''1920. Ohio State University. pp. 113''28. ^ a b c d Yellis, Kenneth A (1969). "Prosperity's Child: Some thoughts on the Flapper". The American Quarterly. pp. 44''64. ^ Lowry, Helen (January 30, 1921). "As the debutante tells it: more about Mrs Grundy and Miss 1921". The New York Times. ^ Freedman, Estelle B. (1974). "The New Woman: Changing views of Women in the 1920s". The Journal of American History. 61 (2): 372''93. doi:10.2307/1903954. JSTOR 1903954. S2CID 155502077. ^ "The Stock Market Crash of 1929 |". www.thebubblebubble.com . Retrieved November 3, 2015 . ^ "Flappers '' Fashion, Costume, and Culture: Clothing, Headwear, Body Decorations, and Footwear through the Ages". www.fashionencyclopedia.com . Retrieved November 3, 2015 . ^ "Women's Fashion in War Work". www.forgeofinnovation.org . Retrieved November 3, 2015 . Bibliography
        Abra, Allison. (September 2016) "Going to the palais: a social and cultural history of dancing and dance halls in Britain, 1918''1960." Contemporary British History 30#3 pp. 432''433.Chadwick, Whitney (2003). The Modern Woman Revisited: Paris Between the Wars. ISBN 978-0-8135-3292-9. .De Castelbajac, Kate (1995). The Face of the Century: 100 Years of Makeup and Style. Rizzoli. ISBN 978-0-8478-1895-2. .Dumenil, Lynn (1995) The Modern Temper: American Culture and Society in the 1920s. New York: Hill and Wang. ISBN 978-0-8090-1566-5Fass, Paula S. (2007) The Damned and the Beautiful: American Youth in the 1920s. 2007. ISBN 978-0-19-502492-0Gourley, Kathleen (2007) Flappers and the New American Woman: Perceptions of Women from 1918 Through the 1920s (Images and or of Women in the Twentieth Century). ISBN 978-0-8225-6060-9Hudovernik, Robert (2006) Jazz Age Beauties: The Lost Collection of Ziegfeld Photographer Alfred Cheney Johnston. ISBN 978-0-7893-1381-2Latham, Angela J. (2000) Posing a Threat: Flappers, Chorus Girls, and other Brazen Performers of the American 1920s. ISBN 978-0-8195-6401-6Lauber, Ellie (2000) Fashions of the Roaring '20s. ISBN 978-0-7643-0017-2Sagert, Kelly Boyer. Flappers: A Guide to an American Subculture. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Press, 2010. ISBN 978-0-313-37690-0Zeitz, Joshua (2007). Flapper: a madcap story of sex, style, celebrity, and the women who made America modern. Random House. ISBN 978-1-4000-8054-0. .Further reading
        Mackrell, Judith (2013) Flappers: Six Women of a Dangerous Generation. ISBN 978-0-330-52952-5External links [ edit ] Wikimedia Commons has media related to Flappers ."1920s fashion & music". 1920s Flapper: Young Women in a Modern World. ."Slang of the 1920s". AACA. Archived from the original on June 18, 2010. ."Flappers and fashion". Rambova. "Thousands of photos of flappers can be viewed at Louise Brooks Fan Club on Facebook". .
      Black Girl (1972) - IMDb
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 14:57
        Mama Rose: [Billie Jean is sulking in her bedroom. There is a bump at the door] Open this door, girl!
        [Billie Jean opens the door to see Mama Rose carrying groceries across the room to the kitchen]
        Mama Rose: Billie Jean, ain't I tell you to keep this door open? Now open that other door!
        Billie Jean: [opening Kitchen door to let Mama Rose through to set bags on the counter] Oh Mama, sometimes I be in here undressing and Mr. Herbert just walk in here without even knocking.
        Mama Rose: [putting groceries away throughout] You don't be undressing all the time. You keep these doors locked, Billie Jean. And who you think you're talking to? Besides, Mr. Herbert done seen plenty kinds of whatever you trying to hide.
        Billie Jean: If Mr. Herbert was married to Ma Dear, that would be different, Mama. But he ain't no kin to nobody in this house.
        Mama Rose: Now that ain't none of your business, Billie Jean. As far as you concerned, Mr. Herbert pay half the rent on this house and he's a roomer here.
        Billie Jean: If he a roomer, how come he ain't got no room to himself?
        Mama Rose: Now that ain't none of your business, Billie Jean, who my mama has in her room. You keep your trap shut about it, or get out and get a place of your own.
        Billie Jean: You're mighty funny when Netta's momma went crazy and she ain't have no place to stay, you opened your big heart and welcomed her in this house. How come I got to get out...
        Mama Rose: [Facing her] BECAUSE Netta's got sense enough to stay in school and get something in her head instead of her tail.
        Billie Jean: [At this, Billie Jean walks back into her room where she sees two kids at the door sticking their tongues at her] You ugly bastards!
        [She chases them out and slams the door]
        Mama Rose: [Running in the room and grabbing Billie Jean] Girl, do you want me to get a stick and beat all the black off of you? Now you must have forgotten what a good beating feel like. Now you better snap out of whatever it is that's on your mind, you hear me?
        [Billie looks away for a second, then Mama Rose drags her to the bed and sits her down]
        Mama Rose: Don't you roll your eyes at me. This ain't Dear you playing with, you understand me?
        Billie Jean: Yes ma'am Momma, I wasn't rolling my eyes at you.
        Mama Rose: And Dear better not come to me no more and tell me you sassed her or Herbert or it's gonna be woe be onto you.
        Ruth Ann: [coming in mad] Billie Jean, what did you call my baby?
        Billie Jean: He was sticking his tongue out at me.
        Ruth Ann: That don't give you no right to call him no bastard! A bastard is a child that ain't got no daddy and my child got a daddy!
        [she walks away]
        Mama Rose: She's just smelling her piss, that's all. Now you're getting your tail out of here tomorrow and finding yourself a job.
        [Rose starts to go back to the kitchen]
        Norma: [Standing at the door] She already got a job, Mama.
        Mama Rose: Already got one? Where?
        Norma: At the Groovy Bar and Grill down on Second and Ward.
        Mama Rose: At the Groovy Bar and Grill? Doing what?
        Billie Jean: Doing that ballet dancing
        Billie Jean: It ain't no ballet dancing.
        Norma: P-A-L-L-E-T is pallet, ain't it? Well, B-A-L-L-E-T gots to be ballet.
        Billie Jean: It ain't even that kind of dancing.
      Google Exec Will Reportedly Keep Working Remote, Opposes It for Staff
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        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 14:04
        Urs H¶lzle. Christoph Dernbach/Getty Images The senior Google executive Urs H¶lzle is moving to New Zealand to work remotely, CNET reported. His move fueled internal uproar as he reportedly opposed remote work for lower-level staff. Google has said it is planning to have most employees start returning to the office in September. See more stories on Insider's business page. A senior Google executive has caused uproar at the company after reportedly moving to New Zealand to work remotely despite opposing remote work for the company's lower-ranking employees.
        Urs H¶lzle, Google's senior vice president for technical infrastructure, told staff on June 29 that he's headed to New Zealand for a year to work remotely, according to reporting published Thursday in CNET. His move has fed claims of special treatment and a double standard in the company's stance toward remote work. He strongly opposed remote work for Google employees who didn't have a certain seniority level or wouldn't be assigned to an office, a resigning employee told CNET.
        "After three decades in the US, my wife and I both felt it was time to consider a new location," H¶lzle wrote in a company memo reviewed by CNET. "We've decided to spend a year in New Zealand and see how we like it."
        A Google spokesperson told Insider that H¶lzle never opposed remote work for employees who didn't have a certain seniority level or wouldn't be assigned to an office.
        Read more: Google's push to bring employees back to offices in September is frustrating some employees who say they'll quit if they can't be remote forever
        H¶lzle requested and got approval for the move last year, before Google announced its plans to return to the office, but he was delayed in his relocation because of the pandemic, the company spokesperson told Insider.
        H¶lzle also said in the announcement that he will continue to work on California time and will drop by the office occasionally, saying he plans to be in the Bay Area "on a regular basis" as travel restrictions ease.
        "If things go well, we may decide to stay longer," he continued in the memo. He concluded, "I'm looking forward to this adventure and to sharing the results of our relocation 'experiment' with you."
        Google has previously announced plans to have most employees start returning to the office in September for three days a week. The company later modified those plans to say 20% of employees can work from new office locations and 20% can work remotely. The remaining 60% will come in the office a few days each week.
        In response to a question from Insider about whether H¶lzle opposed remote work for Google employees who didn't have a certain seniority level or wouldn't be assigned to an office, the Google spokesperson said, "All employees are eligible to apply for either remote status or to work in another city."
        The spokesperson added: "We expect our hybrid model to evolve over time given the wide scope of the business and needs at the team and function level."
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      'Alexa' isn't the only thing your Amazon Echo can listen for. Here's what else - CNET
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        Archived Version
        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 13:51
        Alexa devices like the Echo Studio are known for playing sounds, but now Alexa can listen for them as well.
        Sarah Tew/CNET Alexa-enabled devices with cameras can be your eyes while you're away , but any Amazon Echo device can become a second set of ears, whether you're at home or not. A surprisingly powerful new beta feature called Sound Detection lets Alexa listen for sounds other than just the wake word (typically "Alexa," but it doesn't have to be ). When your device detects those sounds, it can then launch a series of commands in response.
        Alexa can listen for a dog barking or a baby crying, as well as people snoring and coughing. With no sound-based Alexa routine templates in the Featured tab to choose from, however, it's up to you to craft the response you'd like Alexa to have to any or all of those noises. Keep reading for some creative ideas.
        Here, we'll show you how to use Alexa's Sound Detection feature to trigger a routine, plus provide examples for each type of sound your Amazon Echo can currently detect (in case you're wondering how Alexa might help with, say, a coughing fit). Just a reminder -- this feature is still in beta. If something goes haywire (or even if it doesn't) you can direct your feedback to Amazon to help improve the feature.
        Alexa can listen for dog barking sounds and respond with whatever commands you choose.
        Kent German/CNET Crafting Alexa routines can get a little ruffRoutines can be daunting, but this routine and the ones that follow are especially simple.
        Background: I have a 70-pound boxer I call Mucho because he's just so extra. One of the things he does too much of is barking, so I crafted a routine that plays a loud alarm whenever Alexa hears him woofing.
        Now, I'm no Pavlov, but guess what? It worked. At least a little. He seems to bark less now that his dinner-bell brain expects an air-raid siren every time he arfs at a delivery person.
        Brett Pearce/CNET To create this or any routine in the Alexa app, first tap the More menu in the lower right corner, then tap Routines near the top of the next screen. Next, tap the + (plus sign) in the top right corner.
        1. Tap Enter routine name and come up with something fun, like "Sonic Barkinator" (you'll have to capitalize letters manually), then tap the back arrow in the upper right corner.
        2. Tap When this happens, then tap Sound Detection (Beta). Tap Dog Barking at the top.
        3. The next screen will ask which device you want to listen for a dog barking. It appears each device will need a separate routine, so pick the one most likely to catch your dog in the act. After you tap the device you want, tap Next.
        4. By default, Alexa will listen for barking on weekdays from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. and wait 15 minutes before running the routine back-to-back. You can tap Change if you want to modify any of those parameters (then tap Next to get back to the previous screen).
        You can try setting your Echo Show 5 or other Alexa device to play a loud noise and hope it trains your dog to stop barking.
        Tyler Lizenby/CNET 5. Tap Add Action. This is the fun part, where you create the series of commands you want Alexa to run when your dog barks.
        6. First, I tapped Device Settings, then Volume, then I cranked the slider all the way up to 100%. Use your discretion -- 100% is loud. Then tap Next twice (the app confirms your choice).
        7. Midscreen, tap Add Action, then scroll down and tap Sounds. The app doesn't play samples, so you'll have to pick one on faith. I chose Bells and Buzzers, then picked Buzzer, but there are options under Crowds for Crowd applause and Crowd cheers that are less unnerving than an alarm, yet still attention-grabbing -- one of those might work just as well.
        8. This is the most important step if you want to save your hearing: Tap Add Action one more time, then tap Device Settings, then Volume and put your Alexa speaker back to its normal, comfortable volume. Otherwise, it'll be stuck at 10, so the next time you ask for the time or the weather you'll be aurally assaulted.
        9. In the upper right corner, tap Save, then choose which speaker you want Alexa to respond from (presumably the same speaker that hears the bark). The message Routine created successfully will flash across the top of the screen.
        That's it. Now it's a waiting game. The irony for me was actually hoping my dog would bark just so I could see this routine in action.
        I've simplified the steps in the remaining examples, now that you're more familiar with the process.
        A dedicated baby monitor is more reliable than a smart speaker, but Alexa can serve as a backup alert if your baby cries.
        Juan Garzon/CNET Alexa can pull nanny duty, at no extra chargeMy daughter is school-aged now, so my personal cry-detecting routine looks a little different than for an infant (she hasn't triggered it yet, but Alexa will tell a joke to cheer her up if she does). Since that's a little niche, I've crafted what I think Amazon intended when it implemented this feature.
        Note that you really don't want to rely solely on Alexa to listen for your baby crying. Bona fide baby monitors are chock-full of safety, privacy and reliability features that can give you peace of mind that you'll be alerted when your child needs your attention. Digital voice assistants are still a relatively nascent technology and smart speakers, including Amazon Echoes, are notoriously unreliable .
        I'd use this more as a backup. If you briefly wander out of earshot from your baby monitor walkie-talkie, Alexa will alert you on your phone that your baby is crying. Here's how to set that up:
        1. Navigate to the Routines screen, tap the + (plus sign) and name your routine.
        2. For When this happens, tap Sound Detection (Beta), then Baby Crying and choose which speaker should listen for it.
        3. Default is to suppress duplicate alerts for 5 minutes, which is as low as it goes. Tap Change to make it longer.
        4. Tap Add action, tap Messaging then Notification. Type a message to yourself like, "Your baby is crying."
        5. Optionally, you could add other actions. Under the Messaging tab, tap Send Announcement to have Alexa alert you from one or more of your Amazon Echoes. You could have Alexa play a sound, like in the previous dog barking routine (only probably not so loud). If your baby responds well to music, you could have the Echo speaker in their room play lullabies while you're on your way to them by choosing Music & Podcasts in the Add Action menu.
        An Echo Show 5 or other Alexa device in the bedroom can turn up the sleep sounds when it detects snoring.
        Amazon Alexa can cover up snoring soundsA sleeping companion who snores is pure kryptonite for light sleepers, but there's a chance Alexa can remedy the problem before log-sawing wakes you up. I'm neither a light sleeper nor do I share a bed with a snorer, but I do use Alexa as a noise machine to help me both fall and stay asleep, so this is familiar territory for me.
        If you're a light sleeper, you probably have a go-to sound you like to play to help you fall or stay asleep. For me that's brown noise -- most people only know white noise, but there's actually an entire palette of color-coded sounds , each with varying EQ levels across the sound spectrum. For this routine, use what works best for you.
        Start by building the routine just like the previous two, except you'll choose Snoring from the Sound Detection (Beta) menu.
        Under Add Action, if your preferred sound comes from a third-party app like White Noise or Sleep Sounds, you'll want to tap Skills, then Your Skills, then find the app you use among that list. If you listen to a music file hosted on your preferred streaming service (such as Spotify or Apple Music), then choose Music & Podcasts and direct Alexa to that track.
        Even older Alexa speakers like the third-generation Echo Dot can listen for noises like snoring and babies crying.
        Tyler Lizenby/CNET If you're totally baffled by where your favorite sound comes from, you can always choose the first option under the Add Action menu, called Custom. Tap it, then literally just type the command you speak to Alexa to get the sound you like on the next screen, then tap Next. The only problem with Custom is that the app then won't let you add any more actions after the custom command, so you can't do this next part.
        If you don't want the sound to play all night, you can add another action and choose Wait, all the way near the bottom of the menu, then set how long you'd like the sound to play. After that, add just one more action -- tap Device Settings, then Stop Audio. Now choose your bedside device and tap Next.
        Alexa, how much have I (ahem) been coughing?I couldn't figure out what Alexa could do for a cough (beyond maybe ordering cough syrup?) so I asked Amazon. The answer turned me into a real-life head slapping emoji: Once you enable cough detection as a routine, Alexa will start noting every time you cough. Then, if you feel like you might be getting sick, you can ask, "Alexa, how many times did I cough yesterday?" Or the day before, or the day before that, ad infinitum.
        Setting up this routine isn't that intuitive, so follow closely and no, I didn't leave anything off:
        1. Navigate to the Routines screen, tap the + (plus sign) and name your routine.
        2. For When this happens, tap Sound Detection (Beta), then Cough and choose which speaker should listen for it (if you have multiple speakers, you'll have to set this up for each one). Then tap Next.
        3. By default, Alexa will listen for coughing on weekdays from 9 a.m. until 8 p.m. and wait 5 minutes before running the routine back-to-back. You can tap Change if you want to modify any of those parameters (then tap Next to get back to the previous screen).
        4. Tap Save.
        That's it -- no need to Add Action like you do for most routines. Now Alexa will listen for coughing and be able to report back on frequency.
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        First published on May 30, 2021 at 4:15 a.m. PT.
      Austin, Texas proposes largest police budget yet
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        Archived Version
        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 13:43
        AUSTIN (KXAN) '-- City Manager Spencer Cronk is proposing a $442 million budget for the Austin Police Department next year, a record high.
        It comes after more than a year of local debate about the role of police in public safety and how much money APD should get.
        The proposed total is $10 million more than APD's budget in 2019-20. It includes funding for two more cadet classes. Following scrutiny over the department's training and culture, the city restarted cadet classes in June with a new reimagined curriculum.
        ''I'm certainly glad the budget is what it is,'' said APD Interim Chief Joseph Chacon.
        Last summer, following local protests sparked by the deaths of George Floyd and Mike Ramos, Austin City Council agreed to divert some of APD's funding to other areas like Austin-Travis County EMS, a family violence shelter, permanent supportive housing and workforce development.
        The plan was also to eventually move the 911 center and forensics lab out of APD's control and budget. But the 911 center and forensics lab won't be moving out of APD anytime soon because of the state's new law that goes into effect in September.
        Passed by state lawmakers and signed by Gov. Greg Abbott, HB 1900 allows Texas to punish large cities that cut funding for police by capping property taxes in those cities, deducting sales tax revenue or stripping annexation powers. Cronk acknowledged the reality at Friday's budget proposal announcement.
        ''The goal is to keep the independence of some of these areas and to keep the momentum of our reimagining public safety work,'' said Cronk. ''But we know we have to comply with HB 1900, and we will.''
        Proponents of an independent forensics lab say it allows for better transparency and monitoring of crucial DNA evidence. Quality issues were found in APD's old crime lab '-- thousands of rape kits were backlogged and a number of cases, potentially hundreds, were mishandled.
        In May police told us the separate forensics department, directly under the City Manager's Office, would be established by July 1. Then, Abbott signed HB 1900 into law.
        ''Our top scientists, our police and victim advocates have all said that having an independent forensics lab is the right thing to do, so we're going to keep fighting for that,'' said Greg Casar, Austin City Council member representing District 4.
        Under the new law, ''defunding local government'' is determined by comparing the money and personnel going toward law enforcement in a city's budget to that of the previous year. Austin won't lose out on the money diverted to EMS, the family violence shelter and other services, because it is being offset by rising police salaries, pensions and other benefits.
      Haiti on edge as conspiracy theories about President's assassination fill the vacuum - CNN
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        Archived Version
        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 13:36
        By Caitlin Hu and Etant Dupain, CNN
        Updated 7:01 AM EDT, Sat July 10, 2021
        Port-au-Prince, Haiti (CNN) The charred shells of three burned-out cars marked the road to the president's house on Friday in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Just up the hill, former leader Jovenel Moise had been murdered in his bedroom two days earlier, in an otherwise quiet neighborhood of big houses and high walls topped with barbed wire and overhanging flowers.
        What exactly happened during the Wednesday attack is still unknown, along with its motive. But Carl Henri Destin, a local district judge tasked with investigating and documenting the crime scene, described the aftermath in minute detail to CNN.
        "The doors were riddled with bullets, the glass was broken, the doors were smashed, even the locks were destroyed and lying on the ground," he said.
        Inside, up a wide bloodstained stairway leading to a bedroom, Destin says he peered through another smashed doorway, and saw his President lying on the ground.
        "He was wearing a white shirt and a pair of blue jeans. His shirt was ripped and full of blood. I saw 12 visible bullet wounds in the president's body...they smashed his left eye, but both were still open."
        Burnt out cars line the street near the late President's residence in Haiti.
        Violence broke out after Haiti's President was assassinated on Wednesday.
        Dozens of viral images and videos purporting to show the shocking attack are circulating in Haiti and abroad, of which few can be verified as authentic. But hardly any show Moise, the damage left by the attack, or the removal of his body from the house; Destin takes credit for that, explaining that he forbade most other people at the crime scene from snapping photos out of respect for the fallen leader.
        Yet in perhaps a sign of the intense local hunger for an explanation, even the absence of images is spawning conspiracy theories. And in Port-au-Prince, it's all adding momentum to a wave of speculation and uncertainty in a city already rattled by rampant criminal violence, economic deprivation and political instability.
        What we know and don't knowMany questions remain unanswered about what exactly transpired in the Haitian president's house on the night of his death.
        What we do know is that according to the remaining government -- now led by acting Prime Minister Claude Joseph -- Moise's home was attacked around 1 a.m. He was killed, and his wife, First Lady Martine Moise, was wounded. She has since been flown to Miami for treatment.
        A group of at least 28 people are suspected in the killing, of which 26 are Colombian and two are US citizens. So far, 20 of those suspects have been detained, five are on the loose and three have been killed.
        According to a spokesman for the acting Prime Minister's office, those burned-out cars down the street from Moise's house belonged to some of the suspects, whom police later confronted in a shootout. The nearest storefront, decorated with a worn banner quoting Psalm 27:1's "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?" testifies to a fearsome battle with mounds of shattered glass, bullet marks and streaks of blood.
        Bullet casings on the ground in the wake of President Moise's assassination in Haiti.
        Colombian National Police Chief General Jorge Vargas said Friday that 13 retired members of the Colombian Army had traveled to Haiti over the past months and are believed to have been involved in the assassination. But why a group of foreign nationals would attack Haiti's President is still unknown. No statements have been released from the suspects in detention, and the investigation is far from over.
        "There is a mastermind behind this assassination, and that is what we need to find out," Elections Minister Mathias Pierre told CNN.
        Also unclear is how the killers were able to penetrate multiple levels of presidential security, including police checkpoints on the road and Moise's personal guard. Despite the apparent scale of the attack, and signs of rampant gunfire in the President's home documented by Destin, none of the President's guards were injured, Haiti's elections minister Mathias Pierre told CNN.
        The charred shell of a car following the killing of Haiti's President.
        Destin, who collected testimony from witnesses at the scene the next morning, said he has been unable to hear any firsthand accounts of what happened during the attack itself. When he arrived at the President's house, the police security booth was unmanned, and agents without identifying badge or insignia met him at the entrance, he said.
        "I was informed that nobody who was there on the night of the killing was present...I did not have a chance to talk to anybody who was on the scene during the attack," Destin said.
        The investigation is ongoing, and Haiti's interim government has asked for additional assistance from the US and UN to help dig into the matter.
        Senior FBI and Department of Homeland Security officials are expected to travel to Port-au-Prince "as soon as possible" to provide assistance on both security and the investigation, White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Friday. Colombia is also sending its national intelligence chief to aid in the investigation.
        What comes nextFurther down the line, are myriad more unanswered questions, from when the President's funeral will be held, to who should succeed him, and even whether the country is prepared to move forward with much-anticipated elections this fall. Over it all hangs a sense of foreboding, and many streets in Port-au-Prince have been unusually empty.
        The assassination has sharpened fears of other violent outbreaks in the capital city, which saw more than 13,000 people displaced from their homes by arson and battles between police and rival gangs in the month of June alone. Haiti's interim government has now requested that both the US and United Nations supply troops to enforce security at key infrastructural points like the ports, airports and oil terminals.
        Elections Minister Pierre, who feared that he and other top officials might be targeted when he first learned of Moise's death, says he still feels that he could now face retribution for continuing the deceased president's political agenda.
        "Anyone running for office, including myself, knows that we will face danger, and we are conscious of the danger of trying to make major changes in the country," he said.
        A soldier patrols the area near the police station of Petion Ville where people protest after the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moise on July 8 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
        Moise, 53, was a divisive figure in Haiti, and many opposition and civil society leaders had been calling for his resignation for more than a year. His signature project, the subject of a referendum planned for this September, was a proposed overhaul of the Haitian constitution that would strengthen the executive branch -- a change that critics feared would erode democracy, but which Moise argued was vital for leading meaningful change in the country.
        The question of who should even be running the current government is also overshadowed by discord and doubt. Days before his death, Moise named neurosurgeon Ariel Henry as his new prime minister -- which means that between Henry and acting Prime Minister Joseph there are two potential claims to the premiership. And there is an additional challenger for the top leadership role: Reuters reports that Senate leader Joseph Lambert was nominated on Friday by fellow lawmakers to assume the presidency ad interim.
        Meanwhile Destin, the judge, says he is receiving death threats from Haitians who believe it's all a hoax and that Moise is still alive, somewhere. "They are accusing me of being a part of the plot -- they say the president was not killed -- rather he was kidnapped."
        In the current atmosphere, he can't afford to take such threats lightly, he said. "I have received anonymous calls from people threatening me. As a judge, there is not really a security plan to protect me... so I've had to go into hiding to protect myself and my family, my wife and my children."
        CNN's Stefano Pozzebon contributed reporting.
      Blackstone to buy ESG software provider Sphera in $1.4 bln deal | Reuters
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        Archived Version
        Sat, 10 Jul 2021 13:30
        The ticker for Blackstone Group is displayed at the post where it is traded on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange April 4, 2016. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
        July 6 (Reuters) - Blackstone Group Inc said on Tuesday it will buy Sphera, a environmental, social and governance (ESG) software, data and consulting services provider, from private equity firm Genstar Capital in a $1.4 billion deal.
        Chicago, Illinois-based Sphera has more than 3,000 customers and is present in over 100 countries. Its offerings allow organizations to measure and manage their performance and risk exposure pertaining to their ESG activities.
        Blackstone has been trying to strengthen its ESG credentials as investors and lawmakers across the globe increasingly question companies about their environmental and social impact, pushing major global businesses to make significant investments in their ESG initiatives.
        The private equity giant had asked executives in its portfolio companies to report on their ESG matters to their boards for the first time, Reuters reported in early May. read more
        "The increasing importance of ESG issues to businesses globally is a key thematic investing focus for Blackstone," said Eli Nagler, senior managing director at Blackstone.
        Reporting by Sohini Podder in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli
        Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
      Biden isn't ending the Afghanistan War, he's privatizing it: Special Forces, Pentagon contractors, intelligence operatives will remain | The Grayzone
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        Archived Version
        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 22:12
        Over 18,000 Pentagon contractors remain in Afghanistan, while official troops number 2,500. Joe Biden will withdraw this smaller group of soldiers while leaving behind US Special Forces, mercenaries, and intelligence operatives '-- privatizing and downscaling the war, but not ending it.(This article was originally published at CovertAction Magazine.)
        On April 14, President Joe Biden announced that he would end the U.S.'s longest war and withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan on the 20th anniversary of the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks.
        Over 6,000 NATO troops will also be withdrawn by that time.
        ''War in Afghanistan was never meant to be a multigenerational undertaking,'' Biden said during his remarks from the White House Treaty Room, the same location from which President George W. Bush had announced the war was beginning in October 2001. ''We were attacked. We went to war with clear goals. We achieved those objectives. Bin Laden is dead and al Qaeda is degraded in Afghanistan and it's time to end the forever war.''
        Biden's claim that he is ending the forever war is misleading. As The New York Times reported, the United States would remain after the formal departure of U.S. troops with a ''shadowy combination of clandestine Special Operations Forces, Pentagon contractors and covert intelligence operatives.'' Their mission will be to ''find and attack the most dangerous Qaeda or Islamic state threats, current and former American officials said.''
        The Times further reported that the United States maintains a constellation of air bases in the Persian Gulf region as well as in Jordan, and a major air headquarters in Qatar, which could provide a launching pad for long-range bomber or armed drone missions into Afghanistan.
        Matthew Hoh, a disabled combat veteran who resigned from the State Department in 2009 in protest of the war, stated that a genuine peace process in Afghanistan is ''dependent upon foreign forces leaving Afghanistan.''
        Further, Hoh said that, ''Regardless of whether the 3500 acknowledged U.S. troops leave Afghanistan, the U.S. military will still be present in the form of thousands of special operations and CIA personnel in and around Afghanistan, through dozens of squadrons of manned attack aircraft and drones stationed on land bases and on aircraft carriers in the region, and by hundreds of cruise missiles on ships and submarines.''
        Mercenaries R UsThe meaninglessness of President Biden's announcement becomes apparent when we consider that the Pentagon employs more than seven contractors for every serviceman or woman in Afghanistan, an increase from one contractor for every serviceman or woman a decade ago.
        As of January, more than 18,000 contractors remained in Afghanistan, according to a Defense Department report, when official troop totals had been reduced to 2,500.
        These totals reflect the U.S. government's strategy of outsourcing war to the benefit of private mercenary corporations, and as a means of distancing the war from the public and averting dissent, since relatively few Americans are directly impacted by it.
        Most of the mercenaries are ex-military veterans, though a percentage are third-country nationals who are paid meager wages to perform menial duties for the military.
        One of the biggest mercenary companies is DynCorp International of Falls Church Virginia, which as of 2019 had received over $7 billion in government contracts to train the Afghan army and manage military bases in Afghanistan.
        From 2002 to 2013, DynCorp received 69 percent of all State Department funding. Forbes Magazine called it ''one of the big winners of the Iraq and Afghan Wars'' '-- the losers being almost everyone else.
        A blueprint for U.S. strategy in Afghanistan is the 1959-1975 secret war in Laos, where the CIA worked with hundreds of civilian contractors who flew spotter aircraft, ran ground bases, and operated radar stations in civilian clothes while raising its own private army among the Hmong to fight the pro-communist Pathet Lao.
        The CIA and Special Forces have again attempted to recruit tribal elements in Afghanistan and, like in Laos, have become enmeshed in inter-tribal and sectarian feuds.
        For years, U.S. Special Forces operatives have also been training Afghan security forces as a proxy army and running Phoenix-style snatch and grab and assassination missions, which are poised to continue '-- despite the formal troop withdrawal.
        US Special Forces in Afghanistan dress in traditional clothing and try to recruit locals for anti-Taliban operations (Source: ABC News)What Uncle Sam really wants in AfghanistanRepublican hawk Jim Inhofe lambasted Biden's withdrawal plan, stating that this was a ''reckless and dangerous decision. Arbitrary deadlines would likely put our troops in danger, jeopardize all the progress we've made, and lead to civil war in Afghanistan '-- and create a breeding ground for international terrorists.''
        Inhofe it should be noted is a war profiteer. He invested in the stocks of leading arms manufacturer Raytheon at the same time he was calling for an increase in the defense budget as chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
        Inhofe's assessment is flawed because, among other reasons, the U.S. has not made much progress in 19 years of war (the Taliban, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, is stronger than at any point since 2001 and controls about one-fifth of Afghanistan), and Afghanistan was never really a breeding ground for international terrorists.
        The 9/11 hijackers mostly came from Saudi Arabia, and the Taliban agreed to turn over Osama Bin Laden to an international court after the 9/11 attacks, which they never supported.
        The Afghan War will go on indefinitely not because of the threat of terrorism '-- which is accentuated by the U.S. military presence '-- but because the United States will not concede ground in the region.
        The U.S. has announced intentions to retain at least two military bases in Afghanistan after the official troop drawdown, and set up over 1000 bases during the war.
        Uncle Sam also covets Afghans' mineral wealth. A 2007 United States Geological Service survey discovered nearly $1 trillion in mineral deposits, including huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt, gold, and critical industrial metals like lithium, which is used in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and cellphones.
        An internal Pentagon memo stated that Afghanistan could become the ''Saudi Arabia of lithium.''
        In 2001, when the U.S. first invaded Afghanistan, it was in the process of expanding its military infrastructure in Central Asia. Afghanistan provided a key way-station to this new ''oil dorado,'' which holds as much as 200 billion barrels of oil '-- about 10 times the amount found in the North Sea, and a third of the Persian Gulf's total reserves.
        Afghanistan was further valued at the time as a key location for an oil pipeline that would transport Central Asian oil to the Indian Ocean while bypassing Russia.
        Oil/gas pipeline plans through AfghanistanIn the 1990s, the Southern California oil company Unocal began taking steps to build the pipeline, even courting the Taliban. In 2018, ground was broken on a new pipeline project backed by the United States that will carry oil from Turkmenistan to northern India.
        The U.S. ruling establishment's greatest fear is that a complete U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan might result in the U.S. losing a strategic foothold to its main geopolitical rivals, China and Russia.
        China has recently increased its trade and investment in Afghanistan '-- with which it shares a border '-- and has sought to cultivate better relations with the Afghan government and Taliban.
        Russia, meanwhile, reopened a cultural center in Kabul in 2014, rebuilt an abandoned Soviet friendship center, expanded its embassy staff, boosted economic investment, and provided 10,000 Kalashnikov rifles to the Afghan government.
        Moscow also supported Afghan housing projects and took advantage of contacts in Kabul to renew ties with ethnic power brokers in the North while quietly courting the Taliban.
        As a previous CovertAction Magazine article documented, the current Afghan government led by Ashraf Ghani is largely a creation of the United States. Its military is funded by the United States at a cost of around $4 billion per year. This support is going to continue '-- unless Congress cuts it off '-- alongside large-scale U.S. foreign aid programs that amount to nearly $1 billion per year.
        The U.S. wants to keep Ghani in power, or replace him with another proxy that can help it win the geopolitical competition with Russia and China, which is little different from the 19th-century ''great game'' between Great Britain and Czarist Russia.
        As long as the U.S. empire remains intact, the war as such will go on, and on '-- and on.
      Jacobson v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905)
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        Archived Version
        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 21:50
        Historic Public Health Cases/Vaccine Law/Police PowerCom. v. Pear, Com. v. Jacobson, 67 L.R.A. 935, 183 Mass. 242, 66 N.E. 719 (Mass. 1903) This is a suit against Mr. Pear and others to recover a fine of $5 for refusal to submit a smallpox vaccination pursuant to a health statute. The statute in question, R.L.c.s 137 orders all residents of the city who have not been vaccinated or revaccinated to do so due to the prevalence of smallpox. The board of health informed Mr. Pear that he would have to be vaccinated or pay a $5 penalty. Mr. Pear refused and was prosecuted. Mr. Pear claimed that the statute was unconstitutional under both the United States Constitution and the Massachusetts Constitution. The court found that the statute was not unconstitutional. The court recognized that the Constitution of Massachusetts authorizes such police powers in order to protect public health and safety. Mr. Pear also claimed that the court erred in not allowing him to admit testimony of medical experts who opposed vaccination. This case was then appealed to the United States Supreme Court, which upheld the Mass. Court in the classic public health case, Jacobson v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905)
        Jacobson v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905)Mr. Jacobson believed that the scientific basis for vaccination was unsound and that he would suffer if he was vaccinated. The Massachusetts Supreme Court found the statute consistent with the Massachusetts state constitution, and Jacobson appealed to the United States Supreme Court. The Supreme Court examined the issue of whether involuntary vaccination violated Jacobson's "'inherent right of every freeman to care for his own body and health in such way as seems to him best . . . " The Court bifurcated this question, first considering the right of the state to invade Jacobson's person by forcing him to submit to vaccination:
        This court has more than once recognized it as a fundamental principle that "persons and property are subjected to all kinds of restraints and burdens, in order to secure the general comfort, health, and prosperity of the State; of the perfect right of the legislature to do which no question ever was, or upon acknowledged general principles ever can be made, so far as natural persons are concerned."' (at 26)
        With this language, the Court stated the basic bargain of civilization: an individual must give up some personal freedom in exchange for the benefits of being in a civilized society. Jacobson sought to enjoy the benefit of his neighbors being vaccinated for smallpox without personally accepting the risks inherent in vaccination. The Court rejected Jacobson's claim which it viewed as an attempt to be a free-rider on society.
        The Court next considered Jacobson's right to contest the scientific basis of the Massachusetts vaccination requirement. Accepting that some reasonable people still questioned the efficacy of vaccination, the Court nonetheless found that it was within the legislature's prerogative to adopt one from many conflicting views on a scientific issue.
        The Climate Change and Public Health Law Site The Best on the WWW Since 1995! Copyright as to non-public domain materials See DR-KATE.COM for home hurricane and disaster preparationSee WWW.EPR-ART.COM for photography of southern Louisiana and Hurricane Katrina Professor Edward P. Richards, III, JD, MPH - Webmaster
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      Haiti president's assassination: What we know so far - BBC News
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        Archived Version
        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 21:35
        image copyright Getty Images
        image caption Jovenel Mo¯se was assassinated in his home by armed menHaiti's President Jovenel Mo¯se was assassinated by armed assailants who stormed his private residence in the capital, Port-au-Prince, on 7 July.
        Here is what we know so far.
        What happened?
        A group of gunmen broke into the home of President Mo¯se in the Pelerin neighbourhood at 01:00 local time (05:00 GMT) on Wednesday 7 July.
        They shot the president 12 times.
        Mr Mo¯se was found lying on his back, his shirt soaked in blood, with his left eye gouged out, a magistrate said. He had bullet wounds to his forehead, and several to his torso. He died at the scene.
        The First Lady, Martine Mo¯se, was also shot but survived. She has been airlifted to Florida, in the US, and is said to be in a stable condition.
        The couple's adult daughter, Jomarlie Mo¯se, hid in her brother's bedroom and was unhurt. She and her two brothers are in "safe locations", officials said.
        How did the attackers get in?
        Video footage, which has not been independently verified but which is thought to have been taken as the assailants entered the property, shows armed men dressed in black arriving in white SUVs.
        A man appears to have been forced to lie face down in the street while another man can be heard shouting in English over loudspeaker "DEA [US Drug Enforcement Administration} operation, everybody stay down!"
        Haiti's ambassador to the US, Bocchit Edmond, said that while the attackers had disguised themselves as US drug agents, he believed there was "no way" they really were US agents.
        Officials say that the ground between the property's gatehouse and the residence was littered with cartridge cases, indicating that multiple shots were fired.
        The gunmen tied up two members of the domestic staff, while continuing to shout "DEA operation".
        They ransacked Mr Mo¯se's office and took a cheque book in the couple's names as well as the servers that held the surveillance camera footage from the residence.
        The two top security officials in charge of Mr Mo¯se's safety are under investigation and have been summoned to appear at hearings scheduled for 13 and 14 July.
        How did the assailants flee the scene?
        Little information has so far been released about the hours immediately after the attack.
        image copyright Reuters
        image caption The area where the president's residence is located was cordoned offHaiti's police chief announced some 24 hours after Mr Mo¯se's assassination that a fierce gun battle was under way in the Pelerin neighbourhood.
        "We blocked [the suspects] en route as they left the scene of the crime. Since then, we have been battling them" Chief L(C)on Charles said without specifying an exact timeline.
        The police chief also said officers had managed to free three policeman who had been taken hostage by the gunmen. He originally said four suspects had been killed in the gun battle, but that number has since been revised down to three.
        It has emerged that 11 of the suspects fled to Taiwan's diplomatic compound in Port-au-Prince.
        Taiwanese officials said they were informed by Haitian police that the suspects were hiding in the compound early on 8 July, more than 24 hours after the attack.
        Taiwan allowed the police access and all 11 suspects hiding within were arrested "without problems".
        Two suspects who were hiding in a ravine were caught by civilians who had joined in the search.
        The body of one alleged gunman was found on the roof of a home, where he bled to death while hiding. Two more suspects were found dead very close to the president's residence.
        Who are the suspects?
        Haitian police say there are:
        28 suspects in total, of which17 have been apprehended3 have been killed8 remain at largePolice Chief Charles said 26 of the suspects are Colombian and the other two are Haitian Americans.
        The US-Haitian dual nationals have been named as James Solages, 35, and Joseph Vincent, 55. Both are in custody.
        An investigating judge said the two had told interrogators they had been hired as translators on the internet.
        The two allege that they did not know there was a plan afoot to kill the president, but believed they were to act as translators as he was arrested. Haiti's official languages are Creole and French, while the Colombian assailants spoke Spanish.
        The Colombian detainees were paraded before the media by Haitian officials who showed the suspects' passports and weapons they had seized.
        media caption Police paraded the suspects in front of the media along with weapons, ammunition and passportsColombia has confirmed that at least six of the detainees are former members of the country's armed forces.
        The two Colombians found dead near the president's residence have been named by Haitian officials as Mauricio Javier Romeo Medina and Duberney Capador Giraldo.
        Colombian newspaper El Tiempo says both were former sergeants, and they were 45 and 40 years old respectively.
        Haitian officials say one suspect said the group had been in Haiti "for three months", but research by El Tiempo suggests that some of them only arrived in Haiti on 6 June, crossing the land border from the neighbouring Dominican Republic.
        According to the newspaper, they had spent two days in the Dominican Republic, where they visited at least one popular tourist spot. Photos uploaded to their social media accounts show them posing at a monument to Spanish explorer Christopher Columbus.
        What's the motive?
        Haitian officials are convinced that the men arrested are mercenaries and that they were paid to kill the president.
        image copyright EPA
        image caption The president had many enemies but his assassination has nevertheless come as a shock to the nationThey say their priority now is to find the "mastermind" behind the assassination.
        Acting Prime Minister Claude Joseph said President Mo¯se had opposed ''some oligarchs in the country, and we believe those things are not without consequences'". However he did not elaborate further on his suspicions.
        There is no question that Mr Mo¯se, who was a banana exporter before running for office, made many enemies during his time as president.
        His critics accused him of embezzlement and of using gangs to intimidate his opponents, charges which he rejected.
        In 2018, there were widespread protests when he tried to raise fuel prices, and earlier this year a dispute over the length of his term saw powerful figures calling for him to step down.
        The fact that he had ruled by decree for the past year-and-a-half after the country failed to hold parliamentary elections as planned in October 2019 triggered accusations that he was turning increasingly autocratic.
        His plan to hold a constitutional referendum further incensed those who accused him of wanting to increase the power of the executive.
        But when he said in February that an attempt to kill him and overthrow his government had been foiled, many dismissed it as a smoke-screen to divert attention away from the growing discontent in Haiti.
        After all, despite all the political instability Haiti has lived through, the last time a Haitian president was assassinated while in office was in 1915, more than 100 years ago.
      Xavier Becerra - Wikipedia
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        Archived Version
        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 21:08
        Xavier Becerra ( hah-vee- AIR beh- SEHR -É; American Spanish: [haËÎ²jeÉ¾ beËse.ra] ; born January 26, 1958) is an American politician and lawyer, serving as the 25th United States secretary of health and human services. Becerra previously served as the attorney general of California from January 2017 until March 2021. He was a member of the United States House of Representatives, representing Downtown Los Angeles in Congress from 1993 to 2017. Becerra, a member of the Democratic Party, was Chairman of the House Democratic Caucus from 2013 to 2017.
        Xavier Becerra
        Official portrait, 2017
        Assumed office March 19, 2021PresidentJoe BidenDeputyAndrea Palm Preceded by Alex Azar In office January 24, 2017 '' March 18, 2021GovernorJerry BrownGavin Newsom Preceded by Kamala Harris Succeeded by Rob Bonta In office January 3, 2013 '' January 3, 2017DeputyJoe CrowleyLeaderNancy Pelosi Preceded by John Larson Succeeded by Joe Crowley In office January 3, 2009 '' January 3, 2013LeaderNancy Pelosi Preceded by John Larson Succeeded by Joe Crowley In office January 3, 2007 '' January 3, 2009LeaderNancy Pelosi Preceded by John Spratt Succeeded by Chris Van Hollen In office January 3, 1993 '' January 24, 2017 Preceded by Edward Roybal (Redistricting) Succeeded by Jimmy GomezConstituency30th district (1993''2003)31st district (2003''2013)34th district (2013''2017) In office December 3, 1990 '' December 3, 1992 Preceded by Charles Calderon Succeeded by Dick MountjoyBorn ( 1958-01-26 ) January 26, 1958 (age 63) Sacramento, California, U.S.Political partyDemocraticSpouse(s)Carolina ReyesChildren3EducationStanford University (BA, JD)Born in Sacramento, California, Becerra graduated from Stanford University and received his Juris Doctor degree from Stanford Law School. He worked as a lawyer at the Legal Assistance Corporation of central Massachusetts, before returning to California in 1986 to work as an administrative assistant for state senator Art Torres. He served as a deputy attorney general in the California Department of Justice from 1987 to 1990, before he was elected to the California State Assembly, where he served one term from 1990 to 1992.
        Becerra was first elected to the House of Representatives in 1992. He represented California's 30th congressional district from 1993 to 2003, California's 31st congressional district from 2003 to 2013, and California's 34th congressional district from 2013 to 2017. He served as Chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus from 1997 to 1999, Vice Chairman of the House Democratic Caucus from 2009 to 2013 and as a member of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction.
        Early life and education Edit Born in Sacramento, California, on January 26, 1958,[1] Becerra is the son of working-class parents, Maria Teresa and Manuel Guerrero Becerra. His father was born in the U.S. and raised in Tijuana, Mexico, and his mother was from Guadalajara.[2][3][4][5] As a child, Becerra grew up in a one-room apartment with his three sisters.[6] He graduated in 1976 from C.K. McClatchy High School, located in the center of Sacramento.[7] He studied abroad at the University of Salamanca in Salamanca, Spain, from 1978 to 1979, before earning his B.A. in economics from Stanford University in 1980, becoming the first person in his family to graduate from college.[8][9] He received his Juris Doctor from Stanford Law School in 1984 and was admitted to the State Bar of California in 1985.[10]
        Early career Edit Becerra began his career as a lawyer, working on cases involving individuals who had mental disorders for the Legal Assistance Corporation of Central Massachusetts[11] (now Community Legal Aid).
        Becerra worked as an administrative assistant for California state senator Art Torres in 1986.[12] He served as a deputy attorney general in the California Department of Justice under Attorney General John Van de Kamp from 1987 to 1990.[13]
        After incumbent state assemblyman Charles Calderon decided to seek a seat in the California Senate, Becerra launched a grassroots campaign for the California State Assembly, defeating Calderon's Senate aide Marta Maestas in the Democratic primary.[14][better source needed ] He went on to defeat Republican Lee Lieberg and Libertarian Steven Pencall, receiving 60% of the vote.[15] Becerra served one term in the State Assembly, representing California's 59th district, from 1990 to 1992.[4] As a state legislator, Becerra worked to pass a law that would increase gang members' sentences.[16]
        U.S. House of Representatives Edit Elections Edit In 1992, 25th district congressman Edward Roybal announced his retirement after 30 years in Congress. Becerra entered the race for the seat, which had been renumbered as the 30th district after redistricting.[citation needed ]
        Becerra won the Democratic primary with a plurality of 32% of the vote.[17] In the general election, he defeated Republican nominee Morry Waksberg 58%''24%.[18] He won re-election to a second term in 1994 with 66%[19] of the vote. His district was renumbered as the 31st district after the 2000 census.[citation needed ]
        After redistricting, ahead of the 2012 elections, most of Becerra's old district became the 34th district. He defeated Republican Stephen Smith 85.6% to 14.4%.[20]
        Tenure Edit Becerra was a member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, of which he served as chairman during the 105th Congress.[21]
        Becerra voted against the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 because he "wanted to see direct protections for responsible homeowners" in the bill.[22]
        Becerra was appointed assistant to the Speaker of the House for the 110th Congress.[23] He won his bid to succeed John Larson as Vice-Chair in the 111th Congress, defeating Marcy Kaptur of Ohio by a vote of 175''67.[24]
        Becerra successfully ran for a second term as Vice-Chair in 2011 to serve during the 112th Congress.[25]
        During the 111th Congress and 112th Congress, Becerra served on several high-profile committees. He was appointed to serve on the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (often called Bowles-Simpson/Simpson-Bowles) on March 24, 2010.[26] Becerra was selected to serve on the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction (also known as the Super Committee) on August 11, 2011.[27] And on December 23, 2011, he was appointed to serve on a bicameral conference committee to find bipartisan solutions on middle-class tax cuts, unemployment insurance, and the Medicare physician payment rate.[28]
        Becerra had a seat on the House Ways and Means Committee and was the first Latino to serve on the committee.[16]
        Abortion rights and pay equity Edit A writer for Vanity Fair described Becerra as a "strident supporter of women's health and reproductive rights";[29] The New York Times stated that he has been "vocal in the Democratic Party about fighting for women's health".[30] He voted against H.R. 3541, the Prenatal Non-Discrimination Act (PRENDA), which would have imposed civil and criminal penalties on anyone knowingly attempting to perform a sex-selective abortion. The 2012 bill also would have required health care providers to report known or suspected violations to law enforcement, including suspicions about a woman's motives for seeking an abortion.[31] Becerra received a 100% rating from Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice America in 2012.[32][33] Becerra voted for the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009.[34][35]
        Becerra argued before the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that the Little Sisters of the Poor, a Catholic religious order, should be required to provide birth control services under the Affordable Care Act.[36] In late 2020, arguing that the prosecution would discourage pregnant women from obtaining addiction treatment, Becerra requested that the Supreme Court of California block the murder prosecution of a woman who had consumed methamphetamine during her pregnancy, resulting in a stillbirth. The court declined to do so.[37] In response to the Trump administration's 2020 decision to restrict federal funding to California because it requires insurance providers to cover abortion, Becerra stated that "California has the sovereign right to protect women's reproductive rights."[38]
        Committee assignments Edit Committee on Ways and MeansSubcommittee on OversightSubcommittee on HealthSubcommittee on Social SecurityJoint Select Committee on Deficit ReductionCaucus memberships Edit Congressional Hispanic Caucus (Former Chair)Congressional Asian Pacific American CaucusCongressional Progressive CaucusOther political ambitions Edit 2001 Los Angeles mayoral election Edit Becerra ran for mayor of Los Angeles in 2001. He finished with 6% of the primary vote,[39] finishing behind businessman Steve Soboroff, Councilman Joel Wachs, former California State Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa, and the eventual winner, then-City Attorney James Hahn.[citation needed ]
        Consideration for federal government positions Edit In 2008, Becerra was considered for the position of U.S. Trade Representative in the administration of President-elect Obama.[40] While it was reported that he had already accepted,[41] he announced on December 15 that he would not accept the position.[42] Becerra had endorsed then-Senator Barack Obama for president on January 27, 2008.[citation needed ]
        Becerra was on the shortlist for potential democratic nomination to the Vice Presidency by presidential-candidate Hillary Clinton.[43] Senator Tim Kaine was eventually chosen.
        During the presidential transition of Joe Biden in 2020, it was reported that Becerra was being considered for the cabinet positions of Secretary of Homeland Security and Attorney General.[44]
        2020 U.S. Senate speculation Edit In August 2020, California Senator Kamala Harris was selected by Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden as his Vice-Presidential running mate. After Biden ultimately won the general election, Becerra was floated as a possible replacement for Harris, along with others such as Representative Karen Bass, Representative Barbara Lee, Secretary of State Alex Padilla (who was eventually chosen), and former Secretary of Labor Hilda Sol­s.[45][46][47] Early December reports that Biden planned to nominate Becerra as Secretary of Health and Human Services rendered such speculation moot.
        California Attorney General Edit Becerra accepted Governor Jerry Brown's offer to be the attorney general of California on December 1, 2016. The California Legislature confirmed Becerra to the post on January 23, 2017. He succeeded Kamala Harris, who was elected to the United States Senate.[48] Becerra was sworn in January 24, 2017, becoming the first Latino to serve as California's attorney general.[49] Becerra was elected to a full four-year term in 2018 after defeating Republican challenger Steven Bailey and securing 61 percent of the vote.[50]
        While Attorney General, Becerra delivered the Democratic Spanish-language response to President Trump's 2019 State of the Union address.[51]
        California Department of Justice reforms Edit In 2018, Becerra created an environmental justice branch of the California Department of Justice. Among other projects, it opposed the effort to expand San Bernardino International Airport due to concerns regarding air pollution.[52]
        California law enforcement Edit Becerra brought fourteen felony charges against Center for Medical Progress activists for recording fourteen videos (see Planned Parenthood 2015 undercover videos controversy), and one felony charge for conspiring to invade privacy, on March 28, 2017.[53] The charges were dismissed by a California Superior Court judge in June for not stating the names of those recorded and the specific dates of the recordings;[54] the charges were refiled with the names and dates in July 2017.[55]
        In 2019, Becerra threatened "legal action" against reporters who had received records of California law enforcement officers who had been convicted of crimes during the past decade.[56]
        In December 2020, Becerra was faulted by state district attorneys for not taking leadership to help stop unemployment fraud during the COVID-19 pandemic, in what was described as the "biggest taxpayer fraud in California history".[57] In January 2021, investigators said the total fraud was over $11 billion, with $19 billion in claims still under investigation.[58][59][60] Most of this money will likely never be recovered, prosecutors said.[57][61][62]
        Lawsuits against Trump administration Edit In February 2019, Becerra, Governor Gavin Newsom, and 15 other states filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the president's declaration of a national emergency to fund a wall at the southern U.S. border.[63] As of September 26, 2019, Becerra had sued the Trump administration 62 times in total.[64]
        The Trump administration opened 1 million acres in California to fracking and drilling in December 2019.[65] Under the new policy, the Bureau of Land Management proposed new lease sales for oil and gas extraction along "California's Central Valley and Central Coast, touching eight counties and including 400,000 acres of public land".[66] California officials and agencies, including Becerra, filed a lawsuit against the Bureau of Land Management in January 2020.[67][66]
        Despite the multiple lawsuits against the Trump administration filed with other state attorneys general, Becerra had not joined antitrust efforts against any major tech companies. His office would not disclose whether it had examined any tech companies and had not endorsed any joint investigations with other states.[68] On December 9, 2020, it was reported that Becerra's office had joined 47 other states and the Federal Trade Commission in an antitrust lawsuit against Facebook, Inc, headquartered in California.[69][70]
        Ballot drafting Edit As Attorney General of California, Becerra was tasked with writing ballot titles and summaries that appeared on voter information guides and ballots in both the 2018 and 2020 elections. Proponents accused Becerra multiple times of writing biased descriptions that violated the law, which requires "a true and impartial statement of the purpose" of measures. In one of many unsuccessful lawsuits against Becerra, a state judge wrote that attorneys general have "wide latitude" in how they write ballot descriptions. Critics said the responsibility to write the ballot title and summary should be transferred to a different, non-partisan office.[71][72]
        Secretary of Health and Human Services Edit Confirmation Edit After Joe Biden's election as president in November 2020, Becerra was considered a candidate for United States Attorney General.[73][44] The New York Times reported in early December 2020 that Biden would nominate Becerra as Secretary of Health and Human Services.[74] His nomination to lead the Health and Human Services Department has been criticized by pro-life and conservative leaders led by Students for Life of America, citing his "absence of health care experience and his disregard for people of faith".[75][76] He was confirmed by the Senate in a vote of 50-49, with all but one Democrat present and one Republican, Susan Collins, voting in favor.[77] This was the narrowest vote for any of Biden's cabinet positions. It was later confirmed by the Department of Health and Human Services that Becerra had been sworn in.[78] Soon after officially becoming the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Becerra released a statement praising the Affordable Care Act and encouraging people to keep enrolling in its health care program.[79]
        Personal life Edit Becerra is married to physician Carolina Reyes and they have three daughters.[80] He is a member of the Inter-American Dialogue think tank, based in Washington, D.C.[81] Becerra is a practicing Roman Catholic.
        Election history Edit California State Assembly Edit 1990 California State Assembly 59th district election[82][83]Primary electionPartyCandidateVotes%Democratic Xavier Becerra 9,098 34.80 DemocraticMarta Maestas7,35228.12DemocraticDiane Martinez6,70325.64DemocraticSalazar1,5095.77DemocraticBill Hernandez1,4825.67Total votes26,144 100% General electionDemocratic Xavier Becerra 34,650 60.87 RepublicanLee Lieberg19,93835.03LibertarianSteven Pencall2,3314.10Total votes56,919 100% Democratic holdU.S. House of Representatives Edit 1992 United States House of Representatives in California, District 30[84][85]Primary electionPartyCandidateVotes%Democratic Xavier Becerra 10,417 31.84 DemocraticLeticia Quezada7,08921.67DemocraticAlbert C. Lum5,12815.68DemocraticJeff J. Penichet4,13612.64DemocraticGonzalo Molina2,3207.09DemocraticHelen Hernandez1,9085.83DemocraticRoland R. Mora6111.87DemocraticEsca W. Smith4441.36DemocraticMark Calney3361.03DemocraticYsidro "Sid" Molina3250.99Total votes32,714 100% General electionDemocratic Xavier Becerra 48,800 58.41 RepublicanMorry Waksberg20,03423.98GreenBlase Bonpane6,3157.56Peace and FreedomElizabeth A. Nakano6,1737.39LibertarianAndrew "Drew" Consalvo2,2212.66Total votes83,543 100% Democratic holdCalifornia Attorney General Edit 2018 California Attorney General election[110][111]Primary electionPartyCandidateVotes%Democratic Xavier Becerra (incumbent) 3,024,611 45.82 Republican Steven C. Bailey 1,615,859 24.48 DemocraticDave Jones1,017,42715.41RepublicanEric Early943,01714.29Total votes6,600,914 100% General electionDemocratic Xavier Becerra (incumbent) 7,790,743 63.57 RepublicanSteven C. Bailey4,465,58736.43Total votes12,256,330 100% Democratic holdSee also Edit List of first minority male lawyers and judges in CaliforniaList of Hispanic and Latino Americans in the United States CongressReferences Edit ^ "Becerra, Xavier". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress . Retrieved January 13, 2021 . ^ Schmidt, Samantha. "For Xavier Becerra, California's attorney general, the fight with Trump is personal". The Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Archived from the original on November 11, 2020 . Retrieved December 9, 2020 . ^ "BECERRA, Xavier". United States House of Representatives. Archived from the original on November 24, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ a b "BECERRA, Xavier (1958-)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Archived from the original on November 24, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ "CNN.com". CNN. Archived from the original on August 2, 2018 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ "Trump supporters shut down town hall with California Attorney General Xavier Becerra". Daily News. March 24, 2017 . Retrieved December 12, 2020 . ^ Congressional Directory 2011-2012 112th Congress. 2012. ISBN 9780160886539. Archived from the original on December 7, 2020 . Retrieved October 16, 2020 . ^ "Congressional Directory California Thirty-First District" (PDF) . gpo.gov. Archived (PDF) from the original on October 18, 2015 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ Landler, Mark (December 4, 2008). "The New Team '' Xavier Becerra". The New York Times. Archived from the original on September 7, 2017 . Retrieved February 26, 2017 . ^ "Attorney Search Xavier Becerra - #118517". calbar.ca.gov. Archived from the original on October 18, 2015 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ "Xavier Becerra Caucus Chairman Representing the 34th District of CA". dems.gov. Archived from the original on September 29, 2013. ^ "108th Congress Directory California Thirty-First District" (PDF) . Government Publishing Office. Archived (PDF) from the original on October 18, 2015 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ "Xavier Becerra (D) House - California, District 34 - Up for re-election in 2012". projects.washingtonpost.com. Archived from the original on January 27, 2013 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ Acuna, Rodolfo (June 8, 1990). "The Candidate Who Upset Latino Politics: Xavier Becerra owes his victory to the people, not to the blessings of a papacito". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on February 4, 2012 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ "Member of the State Assembly" (PDF) . sos.ca.gov. Archived from the original (PDF) on October 21, 2014 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ a b Hubler, Shawn; Stolberg, Sheryl Gay (December 8, 2020). "Xavier Becerra, H.H.S. Pick, Was California's Anti-Trump Attack Dog". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on December 8, 2020 . Retrieved December 9, 2020 . ^ CA - District 30 - Democratic Primary Archived October 20, 2012, at the Wayback Machine (1992) Our Campaigns ^ CA District 30 '' General Election Archived September 24, 2015, at the Wayback Machine (1992) Our Campaigns ^ CA District 30 Archived September 24, 2015, at the Wayback Machine (1994) Our Campaigns ^ Cook, Rhodes (November 12, 2019). America Votes 33: 2017''2018, Election Returns by State. CQ Press. p. 49. ISBN 978-1-5443-5446-0. Archived from the original on December 7, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ "Congressman Xavier Becerra To Deliver Hispanic Heritage Month Keynote". loc.gov. August 29, 2007. Archived from the original on March 5, 2016 . Retrieved December 30, 2017 . ^ Becerra, Xavier (October 1, 2008). "On the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act". The Becerra Blog. US House of Representatives. Archived from the original on December 11, 2008 . Retrieved December 6, 2008 . ^ Allen, Jonathan (November 17, 2009). "Pelosi thrown 'under the bus ' ". Politico. Archived from the original on November 24, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ Allen, Jared (November 10, 2008). "Dems back off leadership challenges". The Hill. Archived from the original on November 13, 2008 . Retrieved November 10, 2008 . ^ "Larson Applauds Nomination of Xavier Becerra to Serve as Secretary of Health and Human Services". Congressman John Larson. December 7, 2020. Archived from the original on December 14, 2020 . Retrieved December 8, 2020 . ^ Bendery, Jennifer (March 24, 2010). "Pelosi Appoints Spratt, Becerra and Schakowsky to Fiscal Panel". Roll Call. Archived from the original on September 27, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ James, Frank (August 11, 2011). "Pelosi Chooses Clyburn, Van Hollen, Becerra For Deficits Super Panel". NPR. Archived from the original on November 11, 2018 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ Shiner, Meredith; Strong, Jonathan (November 23, 2011). "Congress Passes Payroll Tax Cut Deal, Shuts Down for Holidays". Roll Call. Archived from the original on October 28, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ Lutz, Eric (December 7, 2020). "Biden Reveals COVID Team We're Going to See a Lot of As Crisis Worsens". Vanity Fair . Retrieved January 13, 2021 . ^ Stolberg, Sheryl Gay; Shear, Michael D. (December 6, 2020). "Biden Picks Xavier Becerra to Lead Health and Human Services". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331 . Retrieved January 13, 2021 . ^ CAPAC Members Denounce Attack on Reproductive Rights Archived October 11, 2012, at the Wayback Machine (May 31, 2012) Vote Smart ^ "2013 CONGRESSIONAL SCORECARD". plannedparenthoodaction.org. Archived from the original on January 12, 2013. ^ "2012 Congressional Record on Choice" (PDF) . prochoiceamerica.org. Archived from the original (PDF) on January 27, 2013 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ "FINAL VOTE RESULTS FOR ROLL CALL 37 Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009". clerk.house.gov. January 27, 2009. Archived from the original on July 7, 2010 . Retrieved February 2, 2013 . ^ Representative Becerra on Equal Pay Day Archived May 2, 2012, at the Wayback Machine (April 18, 2012) Vote Smart ^ Hollyfield, Amy (October 20, 2018). "SF nuns say they are caught in the crossfire over a battle over birth control". KGO-TV . Retrieved January 13, 2021 . ^ "High court allows murder charge after fetus is stillborn". AP News. December 24, 2020 . Retrieved January 13, 2021 . ^ Koseff, Alexei (December 17, 2020). "Trump administration cuts off $200 million for California health care over abortions". SFChronicle.com . Retrieved January 13, 2021 . ^ Herszenhorn, David M. (May 9, 2016). "As Xavier Becerra Stirs Crowds, Hispanic Democrats See a Running Mate". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on November 25, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ Landler, Mark (December 5, 2008). "In Trade Post Contender, Political Benefits for Obama". The New York Times. 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Archived from the original on December 7, 2020 . Retrieved November 7, 2020 . ^ Aschbrenner, Annah; Morin, Rebecca. "Who will take Kamala Harris' Senate seat in California? The options are many". USA Today. Archived from the original on November 8, 2020 . Retrieved November 7, 2020 . ^ Wire, Sarah D.; Myers, John (December 1, 2016). "Gov. Brown taps California's Rep. Xavier Becerra to be state's first Latino attorney general". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on December 2, 2016 . Retrieved December 1, 2016 . ^ "Essential Politics: Gov. Brown delivers State of the State address, Xavier Becerra is sworn in as California's new attorney general". Los Angeles Times. ISSN 0458-3035. Archived from the original on May 14, 2019 . Retrieved January 25, 2017 . ^ Miller, Cheryl (November 7, 2018). "Xavier Becerra Wins Four-Year Term as Attorney General". The Recorder. Archived from the original on April 14, 2019 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ Campbell, Alexia Fernndez (February 5, 2019). "California's attorney general gave a scathing Spanish-language rebuttal to Trump's speech". Vox. Archived from the original on November 7, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ Schwartz, John (December 7, 2020). "Xavier Becerra Brings Environmental Justice to Forefront". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on December 7, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ P(C)rez-Pe±a, Richard (March 30, 2017). "Anti-Abortion Activists Charged in Planned Parenthood Video Case". The New York Times. p. A22. Archived from the original on March 30, 2017 . Retrieved March 31, 2017 . ^ Egelko, Bob (June 22, 2017). "SF judge deals setback to prosecutors in abortion sting videos". San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on June 22, 2017 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ Egelko, Bob (July 7, 2017). "California files more charges against antiabortion activists". San Francisco Chronicle. 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ISSN 0190-8286. Archived from the original on September 26, 2019 . Retrieved September 26, 2019 . ^ Seheeler, Andrew (December 12, 2019). "Trump administration opens 1 million acres in California to fracking, drilling". sacbee.com. The Sacramento Bee. Archived from the original on December 16, 2019 . Retrieved January 23, 2019 . ^ a b Canon, Gabrielle (January 17, 2020). "California sues over Trump plan to open land to fracking". USA Today. Archived from the original on January 25, 2020 . Retrieved January 23, 2020 . ^ Willon, Phil (January 17, 2020). "California going to court to stop Trump fracking plans". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on January 22, 2020 . Retrieved January 23, 2020 . ^ McCabe, David (September 26, 2019). "California Attorney General Is a No-Show on Tech Investigations". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on January 6, 2020 . Retrieved October 31, 2019 . ^ "California Joins Lawsuit Against Facebook For Predatory, Monopolistic Behavior". KPIX-TV. December 9, 2020. Archived from the original on December 9, 2020 . Retrieved December 14, 2020 . ^ Feiner, Lauren; Rodriguez, Salvador (December 9, 2020). "FTC and states sue Facebook, could force it to divest Instagram and WhatsApp". CNBC. Archived from the original on December 13, 2020 . Retrieved December 14, 2020 . ^ Walters, Dan (July 27, 2020). "Becerra slants two ballot measure titles". CalMatters. Archived from the original on December 7, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ "Editorial: California voters need unbiased ballot information. Instead, Becerra is playing favorites". Los Angeles Times. August 4, 2020. Archived from the original on November 21, 2020 . Retrieved December 7, 2020 . ^ "Who Are Contenders for Biden's Cabinet?". The New York Times. November 11, 2020. Archived from the original on November 15, 2020 . Retrieved November 11, 2020 . ^ Stolberg, Sheryl Gay; Shear, Michael D. (December 6, 2020). "Biden Picks Xavier Becerra to Lead Health and Human Services". The New York Times. Archived from the original on December 6, 2020 . Retrieved December 6, 2020 . ^ Richardson, Valerie (December 21, 2020). "Top pro-life leaders urge Senate to reject Xavier Becerra over 'anti-life, anti-religion' bias". The Washington Times . Retrieved January 5, 2021 . ^ "Republicans see Becerra as next target in confirmation wars". www.msn.com. ^ "Senate Confirms Xavier Becerra To Head Health And Human Services". NPR.org . Retrieved March 18, 2021 . ^ https://www.executivegov.com/2021/03/xavier-becerra-sworn-in-as-secretary-of-health-and-human-services/ ^ "Statement by HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra on the Anniversary of the Affordable Care Act". HHS.gov. March 22, 2021 . Retrieved March 24, 2021 . ^ Gold, Matea (March 12, 2001). "Congressman Tests His Winning Streak". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on December 7, 2020 . 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Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Presidential General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 2, 2004 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Gubernatorial Primary Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. June 6, 2006 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 7, 2006 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Statewide Direct Primary Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. June 3, 2008 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Presidential General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 4, 2008 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Statewide Direct Primary Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. June 8, 2010 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 2, 2010 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Presidential Primary Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. June 5, 2012 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 6, 2012 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Statewide Direct Primary Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. June 3, 2014 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 6, 2014 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Presidential Primary Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. June 7, 2016 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 8, 2016 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "Statewide Direct Primary Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. June 5, 2018 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . ^ "General Election Statement of Vote" (PDF) . California Secretary of State. November 6, 2016 . Retrieved March 4, 2021 . External links Edit Media related to Xavier Becerra at Wikimedia Commons Works related to Xavier Becerra at WikisourceCampaign websiteBiography at the Biographical Directory of the United States CongressProfile at Vote SmartFinancial information (federal office) at the Federal Election CommissionLegislation sponsored at the Library of CongressAppearances on C-SPAN Join California Xavier Becerra
      ð–¤ Killdozer ð–¤ on Twitter: "@StarshipAlves @adamcurry @ThatLARRYSHOW @joerogan @PrisonPlanet I guess so. That AP article didn't mention it either." / Twitter
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        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 16:39
        ð–¤ Killdozer ð–¤ : @StarshipAlves @adamcurry @ThatLARRYSHOW @joerogan @PrisonPlanet I guess so. That AP article didn't mention it either.
        Fri Jul 09 14:43:06 +0000 2021
      Vaccident? Just After Receiving COVID Shot, Man Slams Truck Into Boat & Narrowly Misses Two Men
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        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 12:23
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      New Zealand children falling ill in high numbers due to Covid 'immunity debt' | New Zealand | The Guardian
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        Archived Version
        Fri, 09 Jul 2021 03:57
        New Zealand hospitals are experiencing the payoff of ''immunity debt'' created by Covid-19 lockdowns, with wards flooded by babies with a potentially-deadly respiratory virus, doctors have warned.
        Wellington has 46 children currently hospitalised for respiratory illnesses including respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV. A number are infants, and many are on oxygen. Other hospitals are also experiencing a rise in cases that are straining their resources '' with some delaying surgeries or converting playrooms into clinical space.
        RSV is a common respiratory illness. In adults, it generally only produces very mild symptoms '' but it can make young children extremely ill, or even be fatal. The size and seriousness of New Zealand's outbreak is likely being fed by what some paediatric doctors have called an ''immunity debt'' '' where people don't develop immunity to other viruses suppressed by Covid lockdowns, causing cases to explode down the line.
        Epidemiologist and public health professor Michael Baker used the metaphor of forest brushfires: if a year or two have passed without fire, there is more fuel on the ground to feed the flames. When a fire finally comes, it burns much more fiercely. ''What we're seeing now is we've accumulated a whole lot of susceptible children that have missed out on exposure '' so now they're seeing it for the first time,'' Baker said.
        The ''immunity debt'' phenomenon occurs because measures like lockdowns, hand-washing, social distancing and masks are not only effective at controlling Covid-19. They also suppress the spread of other illnesses that transmit in a similar way, including the flu, common cold, and lesser-known respiratory illnesses like RSA. In New Zealand, lockdowns last winter led to a 99.9% reduction in flu cases and a 98% reduction in RSV - and near-eliminated the spike of excess deaths New Zealand usually experiences during winter.
        ''This positive collateral effect in the short term is welcome, as it prevents additional overload of the healthcare system,'' a collective of French doctors wrote in a May 2021 study of immunity debt. But in the long term, it can create problems of its own: if bacterial and viral infections aren't circulating among children, they don't develop immunity, which leads to larger outbreaks down the line.
        ''The lack of immune stimulation'... induced an ''immunity debt'' which could have negative consequences when the pandemic is under control and [public health intervientions] are lifted,'' the doctors wrote. ''The longer these periods of 'viral or bacterial low-exposure' are, the greater the likelihood of future epidemics.''
        New Zealand has reported nearly 1,000 RSV cases in the past five weeks, according to the Institute of Environmental Science and Research. The usual average is 1,743 over the full 29-week winter season. Australia is also experiencing a surge, with overcrowded Victoria hospitals also hit by unusually high rates of RSV.
        Peaks like the current outbreak don't necessarily mean the country will have more RSV cases overall, Baker says '' it may just be that all the cases are grouped together, instead of spread out over several years. But even that can cause major problems. ''If you get a big peak it can overwhelm your health system, or put real pressure on it, which we're seeing with RSV,'' Baker said.
        The current outbreak is already stretching New Zealand's hospitals. At Middlemore hospital in Auckland, a playroom has been converted into a clinical space with 11 special care baby cots. Health boards in Auckland and Canterbury have postponed surgeries to divert resources into children's wards. A number of hospitals have asked children under 12 not to visit, to try to avoid spreading the virus. John Tait, chief medical officer for the Wellington area's district health boards said the region had 46 children hospitalised, including two in intensive care. Those numbers were ''continually changing as patients are discharged and others admitted,'' he said.
        Usually, people experience near-universal exposure to RSV as children, Baker said, with most exposed in their first year of life.
        ''If you remove that exposure for a period then you will have a bigger cohort of unexposed children, and therefore '' as you can see we have happening at the moment '' it can sustain a much bigger outbreak when they are eventually exposed to the virus.''
        While RSV is a common cause of winter hospitalisation of children, elderly people and people with suppressed immune systems are also vulnerable. New Zealand's director-general of health, Dr Ashley Bloomfield, said he was ''certainly concerned about the sharp surge in RSV cases''.
        ''We had very little RSV last year,'' he said. ''There's some speculation that [the current outbreak] may be partly exacerbated by the fact we didn't have any last year and so there is a bigger pool of children who are susceptible to it.''
      Cyberbullying Insurance Is Here. Do You Need It? - WSJ
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        Archived Version
        Thu, 08 Jul 2021 13:42
        If you're a victim of cyberbullying, you might be entitled to compensation.
        Insurance tech startup Waffle in May began offering stand-alone cyberprotection policies underwritten by Chubb that include cyberbullying and other cyber risks such as identity theft or extortion. The policies are intended to help victims recover costs associated with cyberbullying, such as legal fees, mental health services, tutoring to cover missed school or relocation costs if bullying was so bad that a student had to move to a new school.
        ''Mark my words, in five years every major insurance company will offer this,'' Waffle Chief Executive Officer Quentin Coolen said.
        Personal cyber insurance is still a nascent category. Only about 10% of U.S. consumers who own Internet-connected devices said they have insurance to help them recover from a cyberattack, and 74% said they're unwilling, or don't know whether they're willing, to pay more for cyber-risk coverage, according to a 2019 survey commissioned by the Insurance Information Institute, an industry trade group.
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        The question is: Do you really need it?
        Specific damages from cyberbullying must be demonstrated for a policy to kick in. The bullying must lead to wrongful job termination in the case of an adult, false arrest, unfair discipline at school or an inability to attend work or school due to psychological injury, according to Patrick Thielen, a senior vice president at Chubb.
        A common form of cyberbullying among kids is using social media accounts against someone. Kids often share social media or online gaming passwords with one another, according to digital safety experts and teens I've interviewed. Sometimes they do it so a friend can help them level-up in a game or maintain their Snapchat streak, an unbroken series of snaps sent back and forth between friends for consecutive days.
        A bully'--which can be a peer or an adult'--who gets hold of a password can post offensive things from an account, getting the account holder in trouble. Or, a bully can create a fake account in someone's name and post things that could get that person suspended from school or fired from a job.
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        Deep fakes, such as pasting a photo of a teen's face on the body of someone else engaging in illegal or inappropriate behavior, can also be created to get someone in trouble.
        Undoing the reputational harm caused by an account takeover or deep fake can require hiring a lawyer and a digital forensics expert to prove it wasn't the victim who posted the content. The psychological effects of bullying can require mental health treatment. In extreme cases, some kids have killed themselves due to cyberbullying, according to news reports.
        If a mental health professional determines a victim to be at risk of suicide, and prescribes psychiatric or other services, those would be covered by the policy, according to Chubb's Mr. Thielen. Funeral expenses wouldn't be covered, he said.
        ''As the threat landscape moves from attacking businesses to attacking individuals and families, I think it makes sense to have this kind of insurance,'' said Jack Koziol, CEO of Infosec, a cybersecurity education firm. He said he has a cyber-risk policy for his own family that includes cyberbullying protection.
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        Some digital-safety experts argue that cyberbullying insurance is superfluous and could cover things already covered by other types of insurance: Mental-health services that might be needed likely would be covered under a family's health-insurance plan. And since most banks and credit-card companies are pretty good about reimbursing account holders for fraudulent activity, paying for financial fraud protection might be an unnecessary expense.
        ''Insurance doesn't solve the problem of cyberbullying. Our time and energy should go toward remedies on the front end,'' said Diana Graber, who teaches digital literacy to students and families. (See below for ways to prevent cyberbullying.)
        Premiums and coverage amounts for cyber-risk policies vary, but for a monthly premium of about $5, families can get coverage of up to $10,000 under Chubb's cyberprotection plan, while a monthly premium of about $20 can get families coverage of up to $100,000. Chubb declined to say how many cyber policies it has sold, or how many claims have been filed. In addition to Waffle and Chubb, there are a few other insurance companies that offer cyberbullying protection, including New England insurer Arbella and global insurer AIG.
        What if your child is the bully? Some homeowners and umbrella policies include personal-injury protection that could cover a parent's legal expenses if they are held liable for their child's actions. It's best to check with your insurance agent to understand exactly what coverage is included in your policy.
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        Some homeowners policies can include endorsements, or add-ons, that provide protection for victims of cyberattacks, but they don't cover cyberbullying. State Farm offers them for cyberattacks, identity restoration and fraud loss on its homeowners policies, but bullying protection isn't included. Allstate doesn't offer cyberbullying insurance either, nor does it plan to, according to Jeff Wright, Allstate's chief information security officer. Allstate offers a free cybersafety course for schools, which includes lessons on cyberbullying.
        ''It's a very fragmented space if you provide coverage for each type of bad thing that can happen,'' Mr. Wright said. ''My money is more on knowledge and prevention.''
        What you can doThere are ways to safeguard social media and online gaming accounts to prevent identity theft and account takeovers, as well as ways to handle online bullying before it becomes a bigger problem. Here's some advice from experts.
        Teach good digital citizenship. As soon as your child has an internet-connected device, it's time to begin talking to them about behaving online the same way they're expected to behave in person.
        Report bad actors. Experts say children should report any ongoing online harassment to a trusted adult and collect evidence by taking screenshots. It's a good idea for parents and kids to read the terms of service for any social media app or online game they have so that they know what's considered unacceptable behavior on the platform and the mechanisms for reporting it.
        Kids should learn to unfollow or block people who are bullying them, but Sue Scheff, author of ''Shame Nation: The Global Epidemic of Online Hate,'' cautions that blocking someone will only prevent a child from seeing what the bully is posting on their account. Ms. Scheff, who won a defamation suit against someone who harassed her online, said she maintains secondary accounts so she can monitor what others say about her online, and she advises parents to do that for their children if they've been bullied.
        Manage passwords. Kids should avoid sharing passwords to their accounts, even with trusted friends. ''Treat your password like a toothbrush: don't share it, and change it often,'' said Infosec's Mr. Koziol.
        Parents can use a password manager to keep track of passwords and access their kids' accounts, if needed. Password managers can generate strong passwords that are difficult to hack. My colleague Nicole Nguyen recommends 1Password and explains the pros and cons of others in this column.
        Mr. Koziol suggests changing passwords twice a year and enabling two-factor authentication, or 2FA, on accounts, which requires an extra code to be entered before logging in.
        Keep tech up-to-date. It may be annoying to have to run updates on all of your devices, but it's important. Software updates include important security patches to keep hackers out.
        '--For more Family & Tech columns, advice and answers to your most pressing family-related technology questions, sign up for my weekly newsletter.
        Write to Julie Jargon at julie.jargon@wsj.com
      Smokers of menthol cigarettes have a harder time quitting - STAT
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        Archived Version
        Thu, 08 Jul 2021 12:35
        A new study published Tuesday finds that smoking menthol cigarettes versus unflavored cigarettes is associated with reduced success in quitting among people who smoke nearly every day.
        In recent years, the FDA has moved to ban almost all flavored cigarettes and cigars, but menthol has remained the lone holdout. Even so, the agency proposed such a ban in April, and researchers say the new findings support this ban.
        In the study published in Tobacco Control, a BMJ journal, researchers at the University of California, San Diego found that menthol-cigarette smokers '-- who made up nearly 40% of those in the study '-- had a significantly harder time quitting than non-menthol smokers. Use of menthol cigarettes prior to attempting to quit decreased the probability of a smoker being able to abstain for more than one month by 28%, and for more than one year by 53%, compared to those who didn't smoke menthol cigarettes.
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        ''This [current study] is the best data we have so far from an observational study,'' said Eric Leas, an assistant professor at the University of California, San Diego and first author of the study. ''It's confirming [the FDA's] choice'' to ban menthol.
        Cigarette makers began adding menthol '-- known for its cooling and numbing properties '-- to cigarettes in the 1920s as a way to reduce the irritation caused by cigarette smoke. For years, menthol use has worried public health experts who say it makes it easier for young people to start smoking and leads smokers to potentially consume more tobacco and nicotine, increasing the risk of addiction.
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        Health experts have also been concerned about the disproportionate impact on certain minority groups. For instance, 85% of Black smokers use menthol cigarettes compared to 30% of white smokers. Black smokers also tend to have lower quitting rates, which is one of the reasons the researchers behind the new study decided to explore the link between menthol use and smoking cessation in vulnerable populations, said Leas. ''It's a clear signal in the data.''
        Previous studies had examined the effect of menthol in cigarettes and similarly found that menthol makes it harder for smokers who quit to stay off smoking, but these were largely conducted in smaller groups. This new study, however, looked at this relationship in one of the largest cohorts '-- roughly 46,000 individuals '-- studied for tobacco use.
        The scientists used data from an FDA-funded nationwide survey called Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health to examine the probability of people abstaining from smoking for 30 days and 12 months. The people in the nationally representative sample '-- 17% of whom were Black Americans '-- were surveyed four times between 2013 and 2018, allowing researchers to track smoking habits in specific individuals. This design also allowed the researchers to identify transitions between menthol and non-menthol use and the factors that might have contributed to the continued use of cigarettes.
        The researchers found that individuals who switched from menthol cigarettes to unflavored cigarettes had a higher likelihood of quitting than those who maintained menthol use. Participants were considered to have attempted to quit if they reported doing so by trying to gradually scale back the number of cigarettes smoked, or by trying to quit entirely.
        The study also found that the association between menthol use and difficulty quitting was more pronounced in non-Hispanic Black smokers. This finding ''indicates the continued threat that menthol poses for the health of Black Americans,'' said Geoffrey Fong, chief principal investigator of the International Tobacco Control Policy Evaluation Project and a professor at University of Waterloo in Canada.
        The new study ''would be another reason why the FDA should go ahead with their plan in the next year and go through regulations to ban menthol cigarettes,'' said Fong, who was not involved with the study but was part of the group that conceived the PATH survey.
        Such bans have shown success elsewhere. Canada, for instance, enacted a similar ban on menthol-flavored tobacco products in 2017, and followup studies have validated the effectiveness of the ban, showing that more smokers quit.
        R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., the maker of Newport cigarettes, the best-selling menthol brand in the U.S., did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
        The study's authors say that they next plan to assess whether menthol use could also impact other aspects of smoking, such as initiation, which would be critical for young smokers. ''The scientific evidence is very clear about the benefits of a ban and the continued greater devastation among those who are smoking menthol,'' said Fong. ''Menthol is not a good thing to have in cigarettes.''
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