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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 8 months

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By: John Barry

Published: Mar 1, 2022

Domestic violence can have devastating effects on mental health, not only for the victims, but for children who witness domestic violence too. It’s such an important social issue that if you were told that someone was the pioneer of domestic violence services in the UK, you would expect them to be a recognisable figure, if not a household name. Erin Pizzey founded the first battered women’s shelter (now called Refuge) in the modern world in 1971, but was marginalised from her organisation because of her support for male victims, and was not invited to Refuge’s 50th anniversary celebrations a few weeks ago. So if the name Erin Pizzey isn’t instantly recognisable to you, then welcome to the topsy-turvy world of domestic violence provision, where not only is the key founder invisible, but around a third of the victims – the men - are invisible too.

John Barry (JB): Your celebration dinner in London recently, which launched the Erin Pizzey award, was fantastic. What was the high point of that event for you?

Erin Pizzey (EP): Firstly, I was really honoured and grateful, and secondly what stood out completely for me was the piper. I just couldn't believe he was so wonderful. I was being pushed by Derek in my wheelchair and the piper wailing behind me. It took place in a lovely venue, beautiful surroundings, fantastic meal and the wine was really good. It was a marvellous evening

JB: What kind of people will be nominated for this award?

EP: The award was set up by Deborah Powney and Rick Bradford, and will be given to people like me who actually fought to make changes. It will be given every year, and there will be a dinner to celebrate. There will be a huge number of people who've never really been heard of because they were airbrushed out of history.

JB: Speaking of airbrushed from history, I saw some of the media coverage of the 50th anniversary of Refuge, and was thinking to myself ‘where's Erin in all of this?’

EP: This goes back to 1971 when the emerging feminist movement in England hijacked the narrative. I had said from the very beginning that the roots of domestic violence stemmed from the family and were intergenerational. This was the case in my own family, with my great grandparents, grandparents and my parents. My father was emotionally abusive, but my mother was physically abusive, and beat me with an ironing cord. I showed the teacher the lashings on my legs, and she said ‘you deserved it - you are a terrible child’. The idea that you could be at a terrible child because you were having a terrible childhood was not properly recognised back then.

When I opened the refuge in 1971, I knew from the beginning that it wasn’t just men. Of the first 100 women, 62 were as violent as the men they had left. These women were the most important to change. Instead of going from frustration straight to raging fights, they needed to learn, and that was the point of the refuge - to teach. And it's not difficult, if we would only learn to [cope with frustration] and, if we did learn it, it would empty the prisons. 90% of men in prisons have come from generational family violence - the same would apply for women - and they've never been offered any other model. So when they're violent - which is what they've learned - we then perpetuate the violence by putting them in prison. But we're not going to punish battered children because they're not experiencing anything that hasn’t been done to them already.

JB: We have the Duluth model for the men, and for the women we don't have anything. Is that fair to say?

EP: The Duluth model has been redundant a long time ago. It was made by a male feminist. Basically, what it does to men is humiliate them. For a start, even before they do the [Duluth] wheel they have to admit to their ‘male privileges’ - what a meaningless statement - so fortunately it has been completely disregarded so that isn’t really on service at the moment.

There is no approach to taking care of women. What they do to women with a history of violence is to take their children away. What happens is the ‘family mafia’ of agencies simply get more clients. One woman who was the governor of a prison said to me that ‘every child born into a violent family is a point on my pension’.

JB: That’s pretty cold.

EP: That shouldn’t be the way it is. We don't offer any intervention to people who grow up in a violent family. This is why the refuge was always full of good, gentle, men. The intervention has to be a mentor, somebody you can up look up to, like I did when I was nine. I went to a holiday home while my parents were abroad, and I saw Miss Williams. She was a golf champion, she drove ambulances during the war. She had this children’s holiday home and I looked at her and I thought ‘that's who I want to be’, and she saved me.

JB: So a mentor can replace a parent?

EP: It doesn’t replace the parent at all. All a mentor does is give you a vision of what you could be. I witnessed a lot of empty arguing between my mother and father, and always swore I would never be like that, I would never lift my voice. And I've tried to do that, but it was Miss Williams who showed me. She was a gentle giant - she was 6 foot 7 - she had 25 children in her care in this very big old manor, and nobody ever crossed her, and she didn't raise her voice. Every night when the children lined up in the hallway to say ‘goodnight Miss Williams’, she would say ‘goodnight’. She had a very good way of thinking - I was really obnoxious and very violent as a child - and she would say ‘Oh well Erin, if you can't control yourself how about you do the washing up for a week’. Well, washing up for 25 children, you quickly learned that you don't want to do that.

JB: The Mayor of London is proposing mentors for boys who have gone off the rails. Do you think this will be successful in reducing gang violence?

EP: Yes I do. I have spoken with boys who are in care and who are fatherless or who have fathers who are rotten, and yes it could make a huge difference, but that's only if it is a real mentoring, and that means an all day mentoring because you are asking this child to change their practice. When you are a child, the thing you have to quickly work at is how you are going to survive in this atmosphere. I chose violence, but some children choose hibernation and it's much worse for them really because they store up stress and end up with migraines, outbreaks of the skin and even stomach ulcers.

JB: I suppose a lot of these boys will come from families that experience violence or coercive control; could an all day mentor break that cycle? Does ‘all day’ mean ‘seven days a week’, or.?..

EP: It has to be an available relationship where the child needs to learn to trust. In a violent family, they will not trust. Remember it’s more likely to be women who are more violent than fathers. The safest place for a child is with its biological father, because after mothers as abusers the next worst is stepfathers, or boyfriends of the mother. We have to really see that those people can change, and we need to apply that rather than just try to jail anybody who abuses children.

JB: Going back to adults, it sounds like men don’t get help whether they are victims or perpetrators. Is there any way that men can help themselves, if they're not getting help from services?

EP: Well no. There are vast sums of money given to the feminists, something like £300 million per year. The Mankind Initiative will help men as victims but they get peanuts. Families need Fathers (FNF) will help in custody cases, but get peanuts. I'm patron of both of those. We need to actually recognise that fathers are just as important as the mothers, and that where parenting is failing we need strategies for survival for parents, and not punishment.

JB: Should men seek anger management from a therapist or go to Mankind Initiative for help…?

EP: Therapists are extremely expensive, so [contact] the Mankind Initiative or Families need Fathers.

JB: Feminist groups are now offering help to male victims of domestic violence. Do you think that men can't be helped by these feminist organisations?

EP: If a man phones on a hotline, before long he finds he is on a perpetrators programme whether he is innocent or not. And one of the problems with the perpetrators programmes is that if he does not do the course, he cannot have access to his children. So if he does the course he has to admit that he is violent, even if he is not. So it's a stick and carrot, isn't it.

JB: Or stick and stick. I didn't realise that if a man phones up these…

EP: There are two organisations. Refuge is the one that was taken from me, and the National Federation is a different organisation, but they do the same thing. They are both feminist organisations. I don't think people know that boys over the age of 12 can't go into refuges. Did you know that?

JB: I think I saw an interview where you said that, and it's been like that for a long time, hasn’t it?

EP: It’s always been like that because of the feminist mantra that all women are innocent victims of males, therefore by the time they become twelve they are pubescent, and then violent.

JB: So these families groups have got the idea that men are inherently violent, or inevitably violent due to socialisation?

EP: They are [said to be] toxic, and what do you think that does to a boy? Young men who go to lectures are told how not to be a rapist.

JB: So can feminist organisations help men in any way? It sounds like they could do more harm.

EP: I agree. They are harmful towards men. The only reason they ever agreed to have anything to do with men is because they were told that they wouldn't get their grants if they didn't [help men], under the Equalities Act. What needs to be done is that all the money needs to be shared equally between programmes for men and women. You would see that the feminists would leave very quickly, with the proper professionals being left to take over. If organisations for men and women shared equally the money, you would find the feminists would leave, because the sharing would have to also be part of the therapy, [recognising] that men and women were capable of being violent.

JB: Could this sharing happen any time soon?

EP: It should, but we would have to then deal with the likes of Jess Phillips and Harriet Harman [Members of Parliament], all of them who - because they want votes - claim that they are feminists. The majority of women will say of course ‘I am a feminist’. But they're talking about equality between men and women - which I agree with - but what they don't understand is what they're actually signing up to is a movement that has nothing to do with men, and sees men as toxic and dangerous. It's a terrible message to give our little boys in school. You know, toxic masculinity includes boys.

JB: Is there any way this situation could change?

EP: You would have to just bring in the Equality Act and make it work, and say that every organisation that gets money for domestic violence has to sign up to the fact that both men and women are equally capable of being violent.

JB: So it would be enforcing the law as it already exists. Is there anybody in politics who would be willing to take up that cause?

EP: Philip Davies is a very good man. All he wanted was International Men's Day. But Jess Phillips told him that every day is men's day. He said that after he had spoken in the House and he was outside in the bar, men were sidling up to him saying ‘You are very brave. I agree with you, but I don't dare say it publicly’. Men have got to get up and be counted. A lot of this is because men don't argue with women.

JB: Why do you think that is, and how can this reluctance be overcome?

EP: Men would have to change the way they approach women. It isn't equal and I think it is very patronising to say that we have to be specially catered for because we are women, and therefore we can't be criticised. But you know, men are frightened of women, I have always said that. When they have been standing on the doorstep in the refuge, I’ve said ‘you have to actually be able to communicate with your wife - you can't go on pretending that what she does is alright’.

JB: And what are men frightened of?

EP: Well these days, you argue with your partner, women pick up the phone - I have seen this happen - and say that you have sexually assaulted her, you have battered her, and the police come around and take the man away, and they don't listen to what he's got to say.

JB: Then surely men are right to be scared of women, if women have so much power.

EP: But how many men's groups do you see doing anything about it?

JB: And what can be done about it, would you suggest?

EP: Stand up and tell the truth, that men and women can be equally violent.

JB: Should they talk to each other in the pub, or talk to their MP, write them a letter….? What needs to be done in practical terms?

EP: Essentially in practical terms it’s about human relationships. We have to go back to the beginnings. We teach sexual relationships in school but we don't teach emotional relationships. I remember there were 900 students in this huge place I was talking to, and everybody was very nervous because the students could be very rowdy, but I just walked on and said ‘how many of you have been hit by a girlfriend?’ You could have heard the silence. ‘How many of you had in your relationship a partner who is morbidly jealous, in other words always fantasising about you having gone out and having sex, even though you know she knows perfectly well you are not’. And these are all terrible signs of instability in relationships. It's interesting because I always said in the refuge, the boys as children are damaged by domestic violence by their parents, one or both, but boys particularly if the mother is promiscuous. It doesn't mean that you can't have transcended it, but…

JB: Back to men seeking help. It is often said that men don’t want to talk about their problems. What can the average man do to improve things, if not for themselves but for other men…?

EP: Join the Mankind Initiative, or FNF, or men’s groups, and that will make a difference. You can talk to other men in the same situation. All that gives a men strength. A woman doesn’t lose anything if she gets rid of a man. She keeps the house, kids, income - he loses everything. The majority of men who are homeless on the street are there because of alleged domestic violence.

JB: I have heard that men sometimes join these groups, but then drop out. Sometimes they join to help with their problem, but once that is addressed, they don’t come back to support other men. Is there any way of getting men to stay engaged, supportive?

EP: Some men will stay, but if you think about it, men have always made their relationships through a woman. It’s her friends, and then it’s his friends. They go to ball games with their men friends, or maybe the pub, but the majority of all their relationships are with other women. And that’s got to stop. Men’s groups are very small compared to womens’. If I asked men to build a bridge you would do it tomorrow. If I asked them to take care of each other, most would not know what I was talking about. Men are not used to caring for each other.

JB: Social identity theory studies have found that men don’t treat each other as ‘an ingroup’. So although all other identities will bring people together, and having a common identity will lead to ingroup favouritism and bias against ‘outgroups’, this doesn’t happen with men. It happens with women though, and in fact men will tend to favour women more than men.

EP: What men do is live their lives through the woman. You ask women and get out and march and protest for something they want, and you get thousands of women. The last men’s march? 100 men turned up.

JB: Given social identity theory, do you think there is much hope of building men’s groups like women’s groups?

EP: There's a chivalrous gene in men, and this is part of the problem.

JB: It's interesting that you called it a chivalrous gene because it suggests there is something ingrained in a man, in which case it is quite hard to change. If women want to band together to change laws to help women…

EP: I saw it happen 50 years ago. I warned people and nobody listened. It's even worse in America, because the women had all that time to insinuate their policies into the laws everywhere into education. All this education is basically abusive because what it tries to do is feminise boys to make them more like girls. Little boys do not want to please women teachers, but there aren't any male teachers. I taught reading to remedial kids in school for a year just to find out what happens to boys, and of course it was boys who were having trouble reading because they didn't want to read the kind of girly books that they were supposed to read. So I found some extremely good books. One of them is called My Brother’s Exploding Bottom, and the boys ripped through them. There is no provision for boys in our society or for men. Hariet Harman said in a policy paper in 1990 that the new family would be women and children. She also said that men were not necessarily harmonious to family life.

JB: has that policy paper influenced many laws and legislation…?

EP: Of course. It's interesting because feminists have been let loose into law, so many of them are barristers and solicitors. What they have done is to expand the laws of domestic violence to such an extent that if he doesn't give her whatever money that she wants, that’s domestic violence; you raise your voice, that’s domestic violence. It doesn't hold for women, but it holds for men.

JB: So are you saying that men need to speak up and get together and support each other in these groups.

EP: It will be historic if they do, but it will have to happen. I don't know how much and how many times men have to suffer abuse for being men, ‘toxic males’, until they finally get it together and understand that they have to get together and make changes themselves because otherwise… The only time, feminists say, you need men is to go to war. Otherwise they are expendable, expendable as fathers. Even though any of us who know about families know that fathers are hugely necessary. Warren Farrell says that for generations now we have had fatherless children. When the father is present in the family, the girl will menstruate much later and is much less likely to get pregnant [at a young age]. These are facts you never hear about.

JB: The Boy Crisis is very good on this. You have written quite a few books, both fiction and non fiction. Do you have a particular favourite, or one that you think people should read in order to understand these issues?

EP: Prone To Violence is the one that there was a huge march against. I was at a lunch at the Savoy for women, and they were all outside with this huge banner saying ‘Erin Pizzey condones male violence’. I had to have a police escort all round England when I published that book. It's hard to get hold of now. You can get it second hand on Amazon. It’s about the treatment programme for violent women and it's a tough read because you are reading about awful abuse of the women who came to the refuge, and some were innocent victims, but the majority were victims of their own childhoods, basically. I would ask people to read that book.

JB: You have been through a lot of tough times yourself, suffered all sorts of abuse, and even homelessness. How did you cope through the tough times?

EP: God. I have this personal relationship and I have always, since about the age of four and a half, been aware that God is in my life and there was nothing that could happen to me without his permission. What was brilliant about so much of it is when you look back, those trials you went through had a purpose to them. Not only do you learn, but other people can learn too. I used to say to the mothers ‘everything that you've been through, it's like a PhD, a social work course you've done’. What was so marvellous was that so many of them who went back to their own communities then got involved in helping others.

JB: Neil Lyndon who received terrible abuse after his critique of feminism, No More Sex War, found his faith to be of enormous importance in helping him through.

EP: That’s very true. I had a terrible breakdown after Refuge when I lost it. I ended up in Charing Cross Hospital for three months and I just remember, you know, when Jesus despairs of the cross, well I remember that moment when I had basically gone down this terrible, terrible, dark hole and my feet touched - physically - the ground, and then this voice said to me ‘There is only one way, and it's up’. And that's when I decided ‘Ok - I'm coming back’.

JB: Fantastic. it reminds me of the saying, I don't know who said it, but it's about when people have so much suffering in their life they eventually ask in frustration, ‘where is God?’ And the answer, according to the quote, is ‘at the end of your tether’. The problem of course is that we have a high male suicide rate, so maybe some men don’t find God at the end of…

EP: Yes, but suicide is to do with abandonment issues, and I've always said that the seeds of suicide begin very early. My grandson committed suicide, and I'm building a foundation with Rita Wright, whose daughter committed suicide. Because we don't understand it and we don't do anything about it, and we need to. I know that after he died, I tried to find organisations that would help me and all I could find was other grieving families who also had nowhere to go. So we're starting a foundation to actually help, or first look into ‘why suicide’. I have said it from the very beginning when you get what I call ‘primary pain’, and this happens very early in childhood. It can be something quite simple, like mummy goes into hospital and the child is too young to understand - because they won't let the child into the hospital - where mummy has gone, and that's the beginning of feelings of abandonment. Or a father can leave the family and walk out and that's when the children feel abandonment. They may recover from that and go on for years and years and then suddenly something happens, and that's when they commit suicide.

JB: Interesting. Martin Seager, who was at the launch of the Erin Pizzey award, has developed an idea about ‘ruptured attachment’. It sounds quite a similar thing. Certainly The Centre for Male Psychology would be happy to work with you on anything to do with male suicide. But to wrap things up, is there any last thing you would like to say to the people reading this article?

EP: I would like all agencies to be especially alerted to when children are showing signs of damage at school, because they tend just to write it off. My teacher said to me I'm a terrible child, but if you've got a terrible child, then how is the child terrible? Children are not born vicious, so ask the right questions and get the right help for children as early as you can, with health visitors visiting houses.

Conclusion Despite having faced unbelievable levels of harassment, Erin Pizzey has been one of the most steadfast, fearless supporters of male victims of domestic violence worldwide. The fact that for decades her role has been airbrushed out of the history of domestic violence support tells you all you need to know about how intense the gender politics is in this field.

Three points stand out in this interview. Firstly, male victims need to speak up in defence of themselves more, and learn to support each other more. Secondly, we need to be more aware of the signs that boys are under duress, and be aware of the impact on them of popularised notions such as ‘toxic masculinity’. Thirdly, domestic violence services have become more about access to funding than about supporting victims or reforming perpetrators. As long as taxpayers’ money is going to groups who don’t recognise female perpetration and apparently aren’t interested in understanding male perpetration, the misery of domestic violence will roll on and on without any end in sight.

#Erin Pizzey #John Barry #family violence #male victims #male victims of domestic violence #male victims of domestic abuse #violent women #domestic violence #generational family violence #false accusations #female perpetration #feminism #western feminism #religion is a mental illness #female violence #duluth model

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enterprisewired · 3 months

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Under Armour’s Campaign: I Will What I Want- A Sheer Masterstroke

Women are women. A separate gender, a separate identity. They are beautiful and independent. They can keep a family together. Above all, if they don’t exist, how will anyone come into this world? Due to the male-dominated environment, women assume they are lower in capabilities as compared to men. Exactly that was pointed out by Under Armour. It was presumed by the public in general that it was a masculine sportswear brand targeting only men. The sales figures spoke it out loud. In 2013, the brand had a sale of $2.3 billion, out of which only $500 million came from women’s apparel.

Kevin Plank, founder of Under Armour, was not satisfied with it and was ready to expand. The brand collaborated with six women athletes: ballerina Misty Copeland, model Gisele Bundchen, skiers Sloane Stephens, and Lindsey Vonn, surfer Brianna Cope, soccer player Kelley O’Hara, runner Natasha Hastings, and trainer Natalie Uhling. Under Armour worked on each story to run an effective influencer campaign. The women featured in the videos are an inspiration to fellow aspiring women athletes to not suppress themselves due to any societal norms or similar degradation.

How Did the Campaign Happen?

Under Armour was considered a male-only brand due to its aggressive and manly nature. Before 2014, the majority of the customer base of the brand was men. The above-mentioned sales figures speak that out loud! The manly appearance made the female target market hesitant to buy the product. So much so that, to achieve the set target the brand had to know what women thought of the brand. Here enters Droga5, the advertising agency hired by Under Armour. They invited women to give their opinions on the brand. The responses were too manly, not for me, aggressive, and too testosterone-filled image. In this way, both, Under Armour and Droga5, got a perspective that women couldn’t relate to the brand. No relatability, therefore lesser sales figures from female group.

Collaborators in the Campaign:

The campaign’s creative team, Felix Richter and Alexander Nowak, came up with an outstanding idea. They got to “I Will What I Want” by emphasizing willpower in a non-athletic style. On behalf of women, they followed a philosophy: My willpower helps me live my way. There was no obligation for me to adhere to any ideology, modern or old. This was the Under Armour Woman’s image they created before themselves and started working on it.

They collaborated with six women who broke the stereotypical image of women. Out of those six women, we bring you three women’s stories here:

The Misty Film:

Misty Copeland, a ballet dancer by heart, had defied the stereotypes. She’s only 5’2” tall with a huge bust and a toned midsection. Learning the dance form wasn’t that difficult for her and she started winning big dance competitions due to her talent. Due to a deformity in her feet, she faced multiple dejections, but her grit and love for the art kept her going. A 30-second YouTube ad was shot with the things she was told not to do, while she is shown doing her part effortlessly while the voiceover goes on in the background. The ad became a huge hit with millions of views in much less time.

The Gisele Film:

Gisele Bundchen, a social media star, and lingerie model, has faced more trolls than one can imagine or take. Again a YouTube video ad, we see a drenched Gisele releasing her anger on a punching bag with the trolls flashing on the walls. Her raw frustrated voice while hitting on the punching bag creates all the impact of the ad. The Droga5 crew were skeptical about the implementation of this ad, but they also knew she was special. Even if a celebrity, you’re never immune to online or offline criticism, is the message portrayed here.

Lindsey Vonn’s Film:

Lindsey Vonn, a skier by profession, had suffered from a serious injury during one of her skiing sessions. As she was too good at the sport, she was popular. But her fans started trolling her by saying will she be able to make a comeback or not, her career is finished, and things similar to it. But her grit and passion made her able enough to come back stronger. The same story is depicted again wonderfully by the Droga5 crew.

The Impact These Campaigns Created:

Under Armour’s dedication to its female consumers through specific products and innovations has continued through 2020. The company is releasing its women’s HOVR Breakthru basketball shoe on September 17—available exclusively through Under Armour and Dick’s Sporting Goods online and in stores nationwide—and its Meridian + Moisture Infuse (M+MI) line on September 23.

The M+MI line is an evolution of their popular Meridian legging, featuring fabric that helps replenish lost moisture and keeps the skin hydrated longer. According to studies, individuals lose an average of one liter of water every hour of exercise; wearers of the M+MI line of products benefit from 26% better moisturization after wearing for three consecutive eight-hour days.

The line also features a no-slip waistband and side pockets; two features directly communicated to Under Armour developers by consumers and athletes through first-hand feedback.

Not to forget the attention to detail by Under Armour. The innovative products they launched like waistbands, side pockets, one-size-fits-all approach, are all masterstrokes by the brand. Magic is created when two giant collaborators come together. In this case, the giants are of course, Under Armour and Droga5.

Empowering Women in Sports:

One of the most significant impacts of the “I Will What I Want” campaign is its contribution to empowering women in sports. By featuring accomplished female athletes such as Misty Copeland, Lindsey Vonn, and others, Under Armour sends a powerful message that women can excel in any athletic arena, irrespective of societal expectations or norms.

Building Connections by Being Digital:

The campaign made excellent use of the available digital mediums to connect with a global audience. Via sharing the stories of the featured women and visually striking campaigns, Under Armour has effectively utilized these channels to spread its message and engage with consumers. The use of social media platforms has allowed the campaign to reach and inspire a diverse and widespread audience.

Conclusion:

Under Armour, with this collaboration, has left a lasting impact on the world. The contribution of the featured women, the crew of Droga5, and the brand Under Armour have made us think about women’s issues. A new way to remind society to stop the discrimination against women and start accepting them the way they are. The phrase “Teamwork makes the dream work” is very rightly pointed out via this gem of a campaign. We need more elements like these to spread awareness among the society.

#UnderArmour #IWIllWhatIWant #EmpoweringWomen #WomenInSports #GenderEquality #AthleticEmpowerment #FemaleAthletes

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nicetrynicetry · 5 months

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New Year’s Eve and I have a burn on my top lip from using a hair removal cream to remove the beginnings of a moustache. I leave the cream on too long while cooking for C, and it begins to melt in the heat of an open oven, dripping down from the localised area I meant it for. As though signs of facial hair weren’t challenging enough, I now have another feminine beauty regimen fail under my belt. Never forget the anal bleaching of 2020, the armpit tendon I sliced into with a razor after deciding underarm hair was no longer serving me, the dismal DIY haircut before Frieze in ‘21, having a sinister gay man dye said hair a month later and reading that crushed up Berocca tablets would rid me of the dye. My hair was orange, my armpit bled, my asshole was the same

The beauty of platonic male - female friendships means C doesn’t mind the state I’m in when he arrives. In fact the only thing he roasts me for is how passionate I seem about cooking for men. I try to remember whether I serve food to my female friends and relatives with as much gusto, and shit, maybe I don’t. “Of course the saying goes that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach”, C says, breaking off pieces of paper-thin filo pasty from the spanakopita before us, “but—“ “But we all know it’s through his dick”, I say. “Right”, says C. “But I’m bad at sex”, I explain, “so I have to excel in the kitchen”. I delicately touch my charred top lip and grimace in pain. It is 8.30pm and we are watching the worst film ever, an ill-advised one we saw the trailer for a few months ago and joked about watching at New Year’s. It’s the first feature length “comedy” produced by the conservative American media company The Daily Wire, about trans women playing women’s sports. It is cruel and unimaginative. It makes stylistic attempts at mimicking Judd Apatow romcoms, with hints of Dodgeball, except imagine every toxic and hateful YouTube Shorts talking head cast where Ben Stiller or Leslie Mann should be. Also it’s not funny, it’s painfully unfunny. Nobody should watch it, like we did, semi-hoping that J K Rowling makes a cameo. Nobody should have to Shazam all the uncanny bootleg pop music that comprises its soundtrack, only to learn that much of it is by the co-founder of Daily Wire’s son. The only silver lining is that it is so unwatchable that C and I can talk happily and comfortably over it

Also the food is, not to be arrogant, extremely delicious. Tomorrow C will be back at the mercy of his Noom app, receiving yassified goal weights to his phone and depriving himself. I make sure his final night of indulgence is worth the price of entry. I try to send him away with a log of cheese-covered pastry that can be sliced and baked to make the palmiers my family loved at Christmas, but he declines since Noom forbids them. Between my bulimic tendencies and his repentant crash dieting, it is a disaster to leave food in either of our hands. What is left goes in the trash. I text D, who is about to go to the home of some hot downtown woman or other, someone there is definitely a W Magazine profile of, explaining that she is “not just a model”. Don’t commit suicide on New Year’s Eve, I think to myself, not while a FedEx package meant for Brooklyn is still held up in Tennessee, not now you’ve already sent out your birthday invites

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desertmountainapothecary · 1 year

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Stop Seeking and Start Creating in 2023: New Year Inspirational Message

Happy New Year from Desert Mountain Apothecary! It’s been a supremely beautiful holiday season here in the California Desert, with wild winter weather, great food, and a siphon’s draw or two of fine spirits. Some years I don’t have any New Year’s resolutions, but this year I’m brimming with them, and most of them are about keeping up with the basics, but some are about new experiences. For someone who hasn’t been on the healing path for nigh on a decade, it can be overwhelming, and truly counterproductive to make New Year’s resolutions. They never stick, and in a month or two you’ll be even farther behind than you were because you feel defeated and de-motivated.

This year, I want to share something that has helped me so much over the years, and more and more over time, as I have learned to hone this skill. This is the skill of creation, creating what we want rather than seeking it out. Seeking is better than just being completely complacent and obstinate towards any positive change, but when you are seeking something, it’s by definition outside of you, and you don’t have it. Worse still, you are dependent on what you are seeking, and by definition creating a need that can only be fulfilled independently of yourself.

I had a friend many years ago who was depressed and asking me for help but being so resistant and negative in the process. She had literally traveled the entirety of the world seeking enlightenment, peace, and inspiration, and was in a darker place than ever. My advice to her was, “I don’t seek happiness, joy, inspiration, beauty, etc., in my life, I create them, every minute of every day.” We create our reality to a very large degree, although obviously external circumstances dictate our lives, the way we react to them, and psychologically and emotionally frame them is within our power.

So today, and in this coming year, I urge you not to seek out happiness, love, a secret weight loss trick, an exercise hack, a tribe, a community, or inspiration, but to create those things. There’s a wonderful saying from Denmark that I always hold dear, I don’t remember it verbatim, but it’s basically, “the happiness we have is what we make for ourselves.” So plan your fun, put a smile on and laugh when everything is going wrong, and at the end of a bad day put a laugh out loud comedy show on and then laugh until you cry rather than just crying.

The most important thing this coming year is that we all need to make that extra effort to be more loving, and more present with the people we care about. A great way to start off the new year is by giving back to worthy and reputable charities.

Shelter From The Storm, Palm Desert, CA

https://www.shelterfromthestorm.com/

Shelter from the Storm helps these women and their children in many different ways including a 24-hour crisis hotline for victims, domestic violence outreach, and providing valuable consultation services to clinical, medical, legal, law enforcement professionals, and local communities about domestic violence. They operate a community counseling center, and provide basic hygiene, personal care items, and nonperishable food items to clients in the shelter service program and those enrolled in services at the community counseling center.

Martha’s Village & Kitchen, Indio, CA

https://marthasvillage.org/

Martha’s Village & Kitchen is one of the largest providers of homeless and impoverished services in the Coachella Valley and Riverside County with over 8,000 people in need passing through its doors yearly. The organization began in 1990 when the founders served meals to their homeless neighbors, fast forward to 2021 Martha’s now has its main campus located in Indio, CA, and three satellite offices throughout the Coachella Valley. Today, from its campus and satellite offices Martha’s Village offers unique life-changing programs based on the nationally-recognized “continuum of care model” breaking the cycle of homelessness and poverty.

ALS Association:

https://www.als.org/

The ALS association mission is to discover treatments and a cure for ALS, and to serve, advocate for, and empower people affected by ALS to live their lives to the fullest. According to the American Academy of Neurology’s Practice Parameter Update, studies have shown that participation in a multidisciplinary ALS clinic may prolong survival and improve quality of life.

From me, William Z. Brennan, and Desert Mountain Apothecary I want to wish everyone a joyful, peaceful, and healthy 2023. Thank you so much for watching my videos, reading my articles, and supporting Desert Mountain Apothecary, I have several projects in the works for 2023 and I am very excited to be putting out a teaser for soon so stay tuned!

With lots of love and all the best,

William Z. Brennan

The Original Desert Apothecary for Mind Body & Spirit: Desert Mountain Apothecary

DMA Journal: https://desertmountainapothecary.com/blogs/blog/stop-seeking-and-start-creating-in-2023-new-year-inspirational-message

DMA YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@desertmountainapothecary/

New Years 2023 Inspirational Message – by William Z. Brennan Desert Apothecary Palms Supreme Wild Siphon Mojave Roots Draw Relaxo Moon Botanicals Snake Vine Grateful Rancho Two Bunch Wicked

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greyswashington · 2 years

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Calico cooper

#Calico cooper tv

Presently, Cooper's tour is set to resume in late-May, with rescheduled dates to follow. When Arizona began advising residents to social distance, Cooper said he and his wife, Sheryl Goddard, had their daughter and son-in-law move in to "keep it all in house" and get reacquainted as a family. He described an uneasy feeling traveling and playing concerts while the virus was creeping into Europe. leg of his tour with Tesla and Lita Ford due to the pandemic.

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The exercise makes Cooper feel less "guilty sitting watching TV all day."Ĭooper returned from touring in Europe last month and was promptly forced to postpone the U.S. He says the family goes out early in the morning when there's no one else playing they're back home by 9:30 or 10 a.m. And they want people out doing something - walking, outdoor activities and they said that is the one sport that is not a contact sport." Calicos band Beasto Blanco has appeared on the Monsters of Rock Cruise, Megadeth Cr. "They say it's an outdoor event, you're not touching anything but your own equipment. Episode 59 - Calico Cooper, singer of Beasto Blanco & Film/TV actress. "The great thing in Arizona is that the golf courses are open," Cooper said. In fact, with the exception of New Jersey and Washington, suburban golf courses remain open in many states that are otherwise being battered by SARS-CoV-2 (the novel coronavirus) and the respiratory disease it causes, COVID-19.ĭuring a recent interview with Forbes surrounding his new podcast, Cooper was asked how he's holding up. Currently, she is also a member of the rock band BEASTO BLANCO.Alice Cooper has a lot of love for his home state of Arizona, and that may have never been more evident than during this coronavirus pandemic when he can spend his 'solitary exercise' on the golf course. Since then, CALICO has participated in eleven world tours with ALICE, has been working as a model and as an actress she excels in comedy and has gained a massive fan base in the horror industry. His main breakthrough came with his third studio album Love It to Death in 1971, where he achieved his first commercial success thanks to the first single and successful hit “I’m Eighteen.” With the following Killer (1971), School’s Out (1972), Billion Dollar Babies (1973) and Welcome to My Nightmare (1975), ALICE COOPER confirmed his position on the music scene and nobody could deny his talent and contribution to the history of rock’n’roll any longer.ĬALICO COOPER appeared onstage alongside her father for the first time at the age of 18 on his Brutal Planet world tour. Horror movies, and he enriched rock concerts with stage shows that featured guillotines, electric chairs, fake blood, snakes and baby dolls. He was inspired by 1950s horror movies, and he enriched rock concerts with st Exclusive in-depth interview (24 A4 pages) with legendary godfather of shock rock and the founder of theatrical rock, together with his beautiful daughter and extraordinarily talented artist, Calico Cooper.ĪLICE COOPER came to fame in the 1970s by combining timeless music and theatrical scenes. ALICE COOPER came to fame in the 1970s by combining timeless music and theatrical scenes. Exclusive in-depth interview (24 A4 pages) with legendary godfather of shock rock and the founder of theatrical rock, together with his beautiful daughter and extraordinarily talented artist, Calico Cooper.

#Calico cooper

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suttonsehested6 · 2 years

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Prime 10 Yves Saint Laurent Girls Handbags Best Ysl Luggage

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A little over two years ago I bought the Michele watch of my goals throughout certainly one of these superb events. The better part is I was ready to make use of the reward card on any item of my choosing. The costs listed under are accurate as of at present on the official Saint Laurent web site. We suggest checking the links beneath for the most as a lot as date pricing data. With their iconic interlocked ‘YSL’ emblem, these luggage can carry you whenever life may take you and are the perfect investment for any Parisian loving trend follower. The Solferino bag, a brand-new addition to the Saint Laurent home last fall, takes some course from the traditional satchel with its boxy, practical design. It has an understated exterior, its foldover flap mounted by a large YSL logo plaque. The adjustable shoulder strap features matching gold-tone hardware. He remained there until 2016, and it was introduced that Anthony Vaccarello would lead the label. 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kemifatoba · 3 years

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C/O Berlin Magazine | It’s a space for everyone, and everyone can come in — Thoughts for the future

“I cringe when I hear words like ‘diversity’ and ‘inclusion.” To quote the civil rights activist, philosopher, and writer Angela Davis, “diversity” and “inclusion” are terms that you, dear reader, might have also stumbled across in recent months, whether you wanted to or not. Inspired by global Black Lives Matter protests, mainstream media, corporations, and other institutions finally realized – in some cases as it seems overnight – that racism is also an intractable problem in Germany. Unfortunately, we need more than just hollow words and empty promises to solve this problem. You might be thinking to yourself: “But didn’t people take to the streets or write opinion pieces in newspapers to protest structural racism? And didn’t major institutions promise to offer diversity and inclusion workshops in discussion after discussion on television?” Perhaps, but don’t be fooled. Instead of critically questioning the role that white decision-makers play in perpetuating systemic racism, “society” was blamed. Over and over again, Black* people were asked to answer if they had really experienced racism through scrutiny of their real-life stories, while predominantly white “experts” were invited onto talk shows to discuss the so-called “racism debate”. Profound, structural changes are still lacking, at least as of the time this text goes to print.

Presence equals power. This brings us to the current moment where you are reading these words about British photographer Nadine Ijewere’s solo show at C/O Berlin. Nadine Ijewere is the first Black woman to be given a space that has previously been occupied almost exclusively by white men. As such, this exhibition is significant not only for Black photographers, but for everyone more used to being treated as the object than the artist or curator in spaces like this where many people don’t feel welcome or simply don’t exist. As trivial as it may sound, visibility comes from being able to hang pictures on a wall—or write these lines.

Joy as an act of resistance. Nadine Ijewere belongs to a generation of artists and creatives who have realized that there are more options than simply following the traditional path. Knowing that society has long since changed—even if many gatekeepers in fashion, art, and the media still cling to the status quo—this DIY generation is creating its own platforms to elevate their own role models with an army of loyal followers. In their work, representatives of this generation create worlds that rarely center Eurocentric beauty norms. The same goes for this young British artist, whose work shows people in all their beauty and uniqueness. Her photographs regularly appear on the pages of British, American and Italian Vogue, i-D, or Garage, and she has collaborated with brands such as Nina Ricci and Stella McCartney. Ijewere proves that beauty is multifaceted and that fashion is fun and for everyone.

More than a seat at the table. When artists like Ijewere make it to the top, it’s not because of nepotism, tokenism, or diversity as a trend, but despite all the obstacles that have been put in their way. And instead of assimilating after being accepted by the old guard, they continue to write their own rules. In Ijewere’s case, this means not only working with diverse models and teams, but also passing her knowledge on as a mentor to keep the proverbial door open. She’s less driven by the desire to stand out from the mainstream than she is to give back by inspiring younger generations, who are able to see themselves in magazines. “Within the time I have, I’ll use every opportunity I get and every space I can get into to expand the horizon of others.”

Representation matters. Celebrating Black people and people of color in a traditionally white space was also the goal of “Visibility is key – #RepresentationMatters,” a watershed moment for the German lifestyle magazine industry when it launched on vogue.de in spring 2019. The goal was to take first steps toward a forward-thinking future where inclusion and diversity would no longer be mere buzzwords, but lived practices. Part of that effort meant ensuring representation in front of as well as behind the camera. The results weren’t perfect and they might not have led to social change, but we proved that there isn’t a lack of creative talent among Black and Brown people in Germany. If anything, we proved that these talents are often denied the space to develop their full potential.

Ideas for the future. As you see, dear reader, it takes teamwork to bring about long-term change, and for the first time the doors are open a bit. Nadine Ijewere's exhibition shows this, as does being able to write these very words in the C/O Berlin Newspaper. In the statements below, we asked German and international artists and creatives to envision a future where representation and inclusion are lived practices instead of rare exceptions. The results are ideas for a future that is reachable—as long as we all keep working towards it every day. Together.

Nadine Ijewere, artist Art is about art. It’s not about you personally. That’s why artists need to be seen as artists. We all get stereotyped and put into the same box—but we have our own identity. We are put into the same space just because we are Black, but we are all very different people.

Edward Enninful, OBE, Editor-in-Chief of British Vogue Nadine is one of the leading fashion photographers of her generation. She’s not only inherently British in her work, she’s also Black British. She really understands the complex mix of culture, fashion, beauty, and the inner working of a woman, so when you see her images, it’s never just a photograph. There’s also a story and a narrative behind it.

Benjamin Alexander Huseby & Serhat Işık, designers for the label GmbH Our work has always been about wanting to show our community and culture to tell our stories as authentically as we can. It was never about “diversity”, but about being seen. We want to create a world where not only exceptional Black and Brown talents no longer have to be truly exceptional to get recognition for their work, a world where we no longer are the only non-white person in the room because we built the motherfucking house ourselves.

Mohamed Amjahid, freelance journalist and author, whose book Der weiße Fleck will be published by Piper Verlag on March 1, 2021. It's time that Black women become bosses. Gay Arabs should get to call the shots. Refugees belong on the executive boards of big corporations. Children of so-called “guest workers” should move into management positions too. People with disabilities should not just have a say, they should make the decisions. Vulnerable groups deserve to put their talents and ideas to work in the service of the whole society. Not every person of color is automatically a good leader by virtue of their background, but all-white, cis-male executive boards are certainly incapable of making decisions that are right for everyone. That’s why we need more representation at the very top, where the decisions are made.

Melisa Karakuş, founder of renk., the first German-Turkish magazine For a better future, I demand that we educate our children to be anti-racist and to resist when others or when they themselves are subjected to racism. I demand that discrimination is understood through the lens of intersectionality and solidarity! I demand that even those who are not affected by racism stand up against it! This fight is not one that we as Black people and people of color fight alone—for a better future, we all have to work together.

Tarik Tesfu, host of shows including the NDR talk show deep und deutlich When I look in the mirror, I see someone who grew up in the Ruhr region and loves currywurst with French fries as much as Whitney Houston. I see a person who has his pros and cons and who is so much more than his skin color. I see a subject. But the German media and cultural system seem to see it differently because far too often, Black people are degraded and made into objects for the reproduction of racist bullshit. I'm tired of explaining racism to Annette and Thomas because I really have better things to do (for example, my job). So get out of my light and let me shine.

Ronan Mckenzie, photographer The future of our industry needs to be one with more consideration for those that are within it. One that isn’t shrouded in burnout and the stresses of late payments, and one that doesn’t make anyone question whether they have been booked for the quality of their work or to be tokenized for the color of their skin. The future of our industry needs to go beyond the performative Instagram posts and mean-nothing awards, to truly sharing resources and lifting up one another. Our industry needs to put its money where its mouth is when words like “support”, “community” or “diversity” slip out, instead of using buzzwords that create an illusion of championing us. How there can be so much money in this industry yet so many struggle to keep up with their rent, feed themselves, or just rest without worrying about money is truly a travesty. If this industry is to survive then we who make it what it is need to be able to thrive.

Ferda Ataman, journalist and chair of Neue deutsche Medienmacher*innen A recent survey of the country's most important editors-in-chief revealed that many of them think diversity is good, but they don't want to do anything about it. This is based on the assumption that everyone good will succeed. Unfortunately, that’s not true. It’s not just a person’s qualifications that are decisive, but other criteria as well, such as similarity and habit (“XY fits in with us”). It's high time that all of us—everywhere—demand a serious commitment to openness and diversity. Something is seriously wrong in pure white spaces that can’t be explained by people’s professional qualifications alone. Or to put it differently: a good diversity strategy always has an anti-racist effect.

Nana Addison, founder of CURL CON and CURL Agency Being sustainable and inclusive means thinking about all skin tones, all hair textures, and all body shapes—in the beauty industry, in marketing communications, as well as in the media landscape. These three industries work hand in hand in shaping people’s perceptions of themselves and others. It’s important to take responsibility and be proactive and progressive to ensure inclusivity.

Dogukan Nesanir, stylist The current system is not designed to help minorities. By giving advantages to certain people and groups, it automatically deprives others of the chance to attain certain positions in the first place. That's why I don't even ask myself the question "What if?" anymore. My work is not about advancing a fake worldview, but about highlighting all the real in the good and the bad. I strongly believe that if some powerful gatekeepers gave in, if representation and diversity happened behind the scenes and we had the chance to show what the world REALLY looks like, we wouldn't be having these discussions at all. I don't just want an invitation to the table, I want to own the table and change things.

Arpana Aischa Berndt & Raquel Dukpa, editors of the catalog I See You – Thoughts on the Film “Futur drei” In the German film and television industry, production teams and casting directors are increasingly looking for a “diverse” cast. Casting calls are almost exclusively formulated by white people who profit from telling stories of people of color and Black people by using them, but without changing their own structures in the process. Application requirements and selection processes in film schools even shut out marginalized people by denying them the opportunities that come with being in these institutions. People of color and migrants as well as Black, indigenous, Jewish, queer, and disabled people can all tell stories, too. Production companies need to understand that expertise doesn’t necessarily come with a film degree.

Vanessa Vu & Minh Thu Tran, hosts of the podcast Rice and Shine It may be convenient to ignore entire groups, but we are and have been so much more for a very long time. We contribute to culture by making films or plays and bring new perspectives to science, politics, and journalism. We’re Olympic athletes, curators, artists, singers, dancers, and inventors. We dazzle and shine despite not always being seen. Because we have each other and we’ve created opportunities to do the things we love. We’ve created platforms for each other and built communities. Slowly but surely we are finally getting applause and recognition for the fact that we exist. That's nice. But what we really need is not just the opportunity to exist, but the opportunity to continue to grow and to stop basing our work primarily on self-exploitation. We need security, reliability, and money. That's the hard currency of recognition. That would mean being truly seen.

*Black is a political self-designation and is capitalized to indicate that being Black is about connectedness due to shared experiences of racism.

Written by: Alexandra Bondi de Antoni & Kemi Fatoba C/O Berlin Magazine April 2021

#editorial #coberlin

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iwanthermidnightz · 3 years

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What do you think she will focus most of her energy on? A split among EL, adidas, and her businesses/investments?

Definitely her businesses and investments. She’s lived a very fast life for 13+ years, that’s a long time, so she has reached a point in her success where she can slow down and focus on things like building her businesses and making investments instead of jumping on a plane every week for a photoshoot in a different country or whatever the case may be. Within the past 2 years a lot of that has changed.

Here’s something she said a few months ago in a video that I never got around to posting but it’s very interesting:

“And so anyways I guess like professionally having my inner circle - I mean I work with - so just to give a little context to tell you about how I run my life and my business. I have been since I was a freshman at Webster Grove a model and I’ve worked in high fashion and I started my career really in high fashion walking the runways around the world in high fashion editorial, Vogues and Vogues of every kind in advertising for Dior, Channel, Este Lauder, Loreal, Victorias Secret, all sorts of brands and companies and I guess in that part of my business I’ve had people that are in my inner circle and that work for me but aren’t necessarily on my payroll so that would be like an agent and a manager and then theres the other side of my business which is more entrepreneurial or what I’ve really gone out of my way to self start and theres two parts of kind of the business that I’ve really built.

One is my non-profit Kode With Klossy which we have a team of five people that full-time focus on running and operating KWK which focuses on teaching young girls how to code, we run summer camps across the country, we train teachers, we build curriculum and we’re really building that out in a big way. I’m hiring a CEO for that now, so thats one part of my non-profit but I treat it like a business it’s a big part of my life and I’m really involved in that.

The other part of my business almost kind of like an incubator style business. So my business partner Penni who is both my manager and [business partner] her role started as my manager and we ended up in the process right now of starting a business that is effectively a 360 management business and I’m both an investor and a client and we’re building businesses around talent and so like for instance if a client wants to build a beauty business we’re building out the business plan, we’re hiring a CEO, we’re hiring out the team, we’re raising the capital so thats another part of my business I’m involved in in partnership with Penni.

And then I’ve had a lot of small projects that I kind of incubated myself. I also do a lot of investing and investing in entrepreneurs. I would consider myself an angel investor. So I write small checks to businesses, I really focus my efforts on investing in businesses that are better for you or better for the planet so that can be really wide ranging and I’ve invested in everything from StockX to SpaceX to beauty brands and food brands and fashion lines and shoe companies.

I’m somebody who loves solving problems, I love supporting ideas that solve problems and I love business and people and entrepreneurship. For me it’s been really inspiring and fun way to be involved in supporting great ideas even if I’m not involved and the founder of that business, but being able to write a check or be involved in another kind of way. So for instance theres this company called Away thats a luggage company,and basically I did something as leveraging my platform as a model and also as an investor and I wrote a check as a angel investor and I also did a campaign with them and a collaboration designing a special suitcase and I got sweat equity in the business for doing this. I gave my services and my time and social media support and did a campaign for this company for equity.”

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lovinajhurani-zaramalikakrystal7 · 2 years

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eauderesistnce · 3 years

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what’s up you guys. i’m jacey, and i’m just about the worst person you’ll ever meet. but !! good news. it can only get better from here. anyway, more about quinn below if you’re interested.

(( if you’ve ever been in an rp with me before and recognize the intro to my intro, don’t fucking @ me. i’m too stupid to come up with anything else. ))

:･ﾟ✧ * ˏˋ / ( lisa, 24, female, she&her ) * hey, i’m looking for the office of quinn amarin. they’re the intellectual property lawyer who’s known around the office as the medusa, if that helps? not to be a gossip, but i’ve heard that they’re tenacious but severe, is that true? i also heard that they’re the one who blackmailed a competitor. anyways, here’s the coffee they ordered. (jacey, 24, she&her, mst)

𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕣𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕚𝕟𝕤𝕡𝕠 !!

chloe decker (lucifer), temperance brennan (bones), amy brookheimer (veep), katara (atla), hermione granger (hp), lisa simpson (the simpsons), belle (beauty and the beast), monica (friends)

𝕓𝕒𝕔𝕜𝕘𝕣𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕕 !!

quinn was born in thailand as sinn amarin to sarai ‘sarah’ and nok ‘nick’ amarin. her mother wa the classic combination of an heiress and a socialite, and her father was the founder of a successful petrochemical company. her mother obtained dual citizenship when quinn was a toddler so that she could pursue quinn’s dance career in new york and los angeles. for the first thirteen years of her life, quinn lived and breathed dance. she was homeschooled in order to spend extra time in her company’s studio, and she was a national title holder for most of her life. her mother was convinced that she could have a lifelong career in dance and a future in modeling.

quinn, however, disagreed. she was a serious child; the kind of kid who always used the steps to get into the pool (( after checking the water temperature first, of course )). she tried to get control of her life in high school. she devoted countless hours to her academic interests in order to get into an ivy league school for pre-law. her mother was devastated. she was only allowed to go if she chose a school close to their pent house in new york.

she earned her undergrad from columbia so that her mother could ensure that she still spent time in the dance studio before and after classes. quinn wriggled out from under her thumb when she graduated early and was accepted to yale for law school. in exchange for a life-changing favor (( that’s a shhh, secret )), her parents footed the insanely expensive tuition and rent bills. quinn quit dance, so she had to appease one of their dreams for her future.

her parents are allowing her to work at master’s as a intellectual property lawyer for now, but the deadline of her untraditional loan is quickly ticking by. unfortunately, quinn isn’t looking to pay it anytime soon.

𝕡𝕖𝕣𝕤𝕠𝕟𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕪 !!

quinn is of the opinion that if you want something, you have to work for it. there aren’t any excuses in life, so either put up or shut up. she takes Extreme offense to anyone who throws away opportunities by messing around.

she’s v cordial at work, so she can come off as cold. she thinks that personal lives should be kept out of the workplace. of course, quinn has no personal life to talk about so that’s an easy motto for her live by lmao.

she’s fiercely loyal to the few friends she has.

quinn’s not actively mean, but she doesn’t know how to sugarcoat things or understand why some people would be sensitive to criticism. she grew up with a hyper-critical mom, so she thinks that’s the best way to improve, and that she’s being helpful when she’s being harsh lmao––but her goal isn’t ever to hurt someone’s feelings. she’s v honest and genuine, but not tactful.

she definitely lacks an ability to understand people who think differently than she does, and she is, of course, always right.

she’s a v literal person, so it takes her a minute to get when someone is kidding or being sarcastic. definitely on the spectrum, but like a lot kids on the high end of spectrum, it went undiagnosed. if she had been diagnosed, she probably would’ve had a psychologist help her learn the social cues she doesn’t understand.

she’s totally ruled by logic and reason. her loyalties lie with concrete evidence above all else.

she can often come off as arrogant. she doesn’t brag or flex, but she’s definitely not humble lmao. she is definitely aware that she’s smart and beautiful lmao, and she’s far more likely to say, “i know,” than, “thank you,” to a compliment.

she hasn’t danced since she was 19, and it’s entirely to prove a point to her mom even though she did love dancing before her mom became her momager. *you’re doing amazing, sweetie*

she’s v embarrassed that she wanted to be a ballerina when she was eight bc how immature and unrealistic. it’s not like she was four.

she has a dog who she loves more than any human. she’s a german shepherd named lizzie (after elizabeth bennet of course).

she loves art and poetry history. she’s also really into the history of fashion and fashion in general. most of her money (that doesn’t go into a 401k and her investment portfolio) goes towards art pieces and handbags.

she views relationships as a basic tier in maslow’s hierarchy of needs, similar to food or shelter. to her, sex is just a means to an orgasm, and orgasms are occasionally necessary to release tension. so ,,, she’s never had a romantic partner lmao, and she’s not interested in any unnecessary distractions from her work.

𝕨𝕒𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕕 𝕔𝕠𝕟𝕟𝕖𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤 !!

best friends: ( m, f, nb ), childhood friends: ( m, f, nb ), fwb: (m, f, nb), casual hookup ( m, f, nb), work rivals: ( m, f, nb ), enemies: ( m, f, nb )

all the connections tbh. hmu or like this and i’ll hit you up !!

#masters.intro

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ninjasmart · 3 years

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What is Jack Schlossberg, President John Kennedy’s only grandson’s ikigai?

1. Ikigai is a concept coming from Japan that means - reason for being. Many people focus on the career, on the work, but don’t feel fulfilled. If you do what you love, what you’re good at, what others need you to do for them, what the world needs more of, what others are willing to pay for, then you’re on Your Path.

2. With Jack Schlossberg, the career is an obsession. I can see him exhausted trying to do everything. It is interesting, people who try to fulfill two different life paths usually have more than one name. With him - there’s overstacking on building the background for a political figure - the education, the charities. It’s like - we gave birth to you - now, go and become a president.

At the same time - he’s really good at Blue Bloods. There’s future for Officer Jack in the industry. I’m thinking, should I really do a love reading on him. He’s so focused on what will make mom happy, the family proud of a Kennedy and what will make me happy, and I’ll do both, cause I’m ambitious.

3. I’ll cut to the chase because his ikigai is the Moon. Literally the world of illusions. That’s equally as valid for the entertainment industry as for politics. His family need not worry and have faith in him.

It’s interesting, though, I keep getting the question - what do you need all those Diplomas for? He was raised as very responsible overachiever. The path he was put on is ambitious. The question is - is it his path.

I think there is future for him on the big screen. If he thinks he needs to overachieve to prove he can do it and it’s not all because of who he is - he needs to remember to just say Thank you. That’s enough. Those who are envious will always find something to envy him for. Those who are not will see that he is fortunate to have access to the elite schools of the land and one can only be happy for him. Those who can those who have access to the elite also have the responsibility to make the world a better place including for those who can’t.

Because, let me tell you, there are people who have access to the resources to which he has access to and do not do good on their responsibility to society. This guy, Jack Schlossberg, he’s solid. Not just responsible. Solid. Good things can be expected from him. And, if one day he ends up as a political satire comedian - he’ll revolutionize it.

His service to the world is in the public eye - whether from a TV show, or a Netflix show, or a News anchor, or a late night comedy show, or from the Senate - he’ll be good at it. We need more people like him in the world.

4. What’s his passion - 7 of cups reversed. He is not unclear what he is passionate about. He was born into prestige, respect, I’d say - American royalty, he is gorgeous. The 7 cups in the 7 of cups stand for - the temptation, the desires of the heart: health, wealth, fame, glory, castles, salvation. He was born into that. He makes good on his bloodline with his more serious pursuit. I would only add that the Blue Bloods and the acting is not whimsical pursuit. It is not less serious or less respectable. It is one aspect of what he’s good at - and that is: acting. Unlike our faux royal MM, he IS good at it. Keep on practicing, boy, the world needs you.

5. What he loves - Well, if you leave him on his own accord, he’ll be , 8 of pentacles reversed. These are the employees every manager “loves” - who can find how to cheat the close and will put in only the minimum effort to not get fired but also to not be noticed by the managers with good performance. As business owners they’ll love to have their name under the CEO or Founder position but the long hours, blood sweat and tears will be optional for them.

If you leave him to slack off he’ll do it and he’ll be really good at it. Two possible reasons for that. I really think he’s overly ambitious and an overachiever. That leads to what unsuccessful people will call “bite more than you could chew”. In hi case - he’ll do it, he’ll make it, he’ll succeed even if this makes him a slacker in one are or looking like a lazy person in some other area. He’s not lazy, he’s got way too much on his plate and he’s juggling it all.

So, the first explanation is - it’s an exhaustion symptom. He’d love to just relax and do nothing because he is constantly achieving something and rarely takes time to really do nothing and recharge his batteries.

The second one is - he was raised to not be a slacker. So he’d love to be like the regular Jacks but that’s not who he is and he knows it.

6. What the world needs - the high priestess. Divine Feminine. Champion of human, feminine rights. And, please get me right - a champion of the Divine Feminine is a man who defends, makes a woman safe, help her, treats her right. A gentleman in the true sense of the word.

The high priestess is one of my favorite cards. I would also interpret it as - finish your degree, do not drop out. It was cool, but now it is not. Be a man of your family and graduate. Then, go back to school for acting. Find your acting mentor - a woman, a woman of considerable age. I think she’s very well known teacher. Learn from her. She has a lot to offer.

Perfect your acting skills because you’ll make good use of them in the future.

7. What is he going to be paid for - In ikigai this is what is important part of getting out of bed in the morning. Not only to give to others more than you receive back in monetary value but to also receive that monetary value.

10 of wands is a beautiful advice card here. He needs to form partnerships and always, always delegate and be clear on roles and responsibilities and to share the workload. He doesn’t have to do it all on his own. In order for him to be better in achievements, he needs to learn to find the right people to delegate the workload to. That will not make him less of a workaholic. But it will carve some time for mindfulness, focus and strategic thinking.

He’s already studying for that so thumbs up, he chose well.

8. What is he good at - 2 of wands. Money. He’s good at handling money, making money, creating multiple streams of income. If he wants to write a book - his mindset and management of personal finances will be a bestseller.

9. His mission in life - 4 of swords reversed. I already talked about it. If he thought that he’s one of those rich kids of legends, who are supposed to make good to their ancestors but will never come out of their famous relative’s shadow whether they make use of the privileges in life or not --- that’s not his path.

He is not supposed to life a private life outside of the eyes of the media. ... some of the download got lost because I was distracted for a moment... Whe nthe time comes his ancestry will play a deciding factor. Until then - be in the public eye as much as possible. Rack up those fans and followers. The world needs you - you, not who you thought you are or who you were told you should be.

10. His vocation - 5 of pentacles. It’s a hard card to read. If I could make a guess - it can show his current situation at his environment - work, school, professional sphere. He’s meeting with a lot of isolation - you’re not like us, you’re from the royalty. If I was to guess, he’s experiencing it in a lot of areas - things handed to him because of his last name, or things not given to him again because of his last name.

I think that this is the reason he is so determined to show them all, to achieve it all, to be successful no matter what... you know the saying - when life gives you lemons, make a lemonade... and then sell it for profit.

This type of attitude towards him comes with the territory. It is part of who he is and this is where the acting skills can help even more to show him as relatable. And also, we are not given a challenge unless this is what defines us and makes us not stronger but makes us ...words are escaping when I come to explaining this. My guess is that he needs to figure it out on his own.

However, those challenges are what he came here to achieve in solving. He can become very relatable. Very, very relatable. If he could only see those challenging situations as an invitation to turn these people as his fans instead of enemies or frenemies or people who secretly dislike him or envy him, he’ll be performing his calling to a T. Later on in life he’ll be a role model. Might as well start now.

11. His profession - the Fool. The Fool as profession is an interesting card. First, he need to embody the qualities of the Fool card. To make it seem that what he has been achieving is easy, leisurely, effortlessly, and that anyone can achieve it.

He’s ok to continue to be ambitious. Signing new acting contracts, following double major after double major on the side. As advice - do not be afraid to start over or start new things constantly. This is who you are. Make it seem effortless and secretly work really hard to make it happen.

#johnkennedy #jack schlossberg #tarot reading #akashic records #forentertainmentpurposesonly

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dyke-bars-never-last · 2 years

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Louise Fishman

(January 14, 1939 – July 26, 2021)

In the postwar era, when the popular role model Rosie the Riveter was refashioned into June Cleaver, Fishman was a basketball player intent on becoming an artist. The liberating physicality of the gesture eventually drew Fishman toward painting. Not to mention the powerful impact of her mother and aunt, both were professionally active women artists.

“Reinvent myself ”

When I was meeting with my women’s group, circa 1969— I decided never to paint again, unless it came out of my own experience. I began to learn stitching, knotting, working with liquid rubber and many other materials I found in the surplus store ... I cut my large grid paintings into strips and began to weave them together.

By approaching painting as a kind of quilt-making, Fishman gendered her materials, politicizing the given or “neutral” aspects of painting. The Victory Garden of the Amazon Queen (1972), landed her in the 1973 Whitney Museum Biennial.

I was thrilled to be included, but suffered severely because of the difficulty of being singled out, separating me from my mother and my aunt and the other members of my painters’ group who were not included.

The “Angry” series

From 1973, Fishman scrawled the righteous feelings of her female lovers, friends and comrades-in-arms across each painting, breaking yet another modernist taboo—the one against treating text as image.

I made a decision to make an angry painting for my then partner, and then for each of my women friends, and finally for women who had inspired me, that I loved, (Institute of Contemporary Art Philadelphia founder Ti-Grace Atkinson, the dancer Yvonne Rainer) etc.

Both a structure & a disintegrative force

Although Fishman had come out in the late 1950s, it wasn’t until the early ’70s that she found her community in a group of lesbian writers and academics. Envious of their journalistic skills, she used the idea of writing to generate a new body of work.

She took up meditation, and Buddhist art became an important influence on her work. Chinese calligraphy, in particular, conflated gesture with writing.

“Remembrance & Renewal”

In 1988, Fishman was deeply moved by her visit to the Pond of Ashes, a memorial built on the site of the Birkenau crematorium, and she collected a handful of silt while there. The ashes were mixed into oil paint, a theatrical act that rendered Jewish identity materially present yet still largely invisible.

I am a Jew and will always identify as one. I try to follow the Judaism described by Abraham Heschel: compassion and love for all creatures, despite how difficult I sometimes find that task to be. That is, of course, an utter simplification of Heschel’s teachings. I try to be present when there is suffering.

The Grid

Fishman’s studio in upstate New York was destroyed in a fire in 1990, so she relocated to New Mexico. She began spending time with Agnes Martin in her studio, and the close contact with Martin’s drawings rekindled her interest in the grid. Fishman saw that the grid could be employed as a form of meditation rather than simply a compositional device.

Despite (or, perhaps, because of) the trauma of the fire, the mournful, anxious introspection that marked the “Remembrance and Renewal” paintings was replaced by a new confidence and depth of feeling.

Letting go of her nagging mistrust of beauty, Fishman uses a roller to help create a roughly gridded black ground punctuated by window-like patches of color.

“Black Paintings” & interlocking calligraphic marks

Since 1996, her paintings, suspended between states of becoming & decay, emergence & dissolution, evoke ruins built upon ruins, the feeling that the artist is excavating, searching for what has been hidden as well as properly burying that which has been neglected or forgotten by others.

Shades of blue

Fishman recalled that the blue hues of her paintings made in the early 2010s were variously alluded to a 2011 visit to Venice -- the ocean surrounding the Italian city, Titian paintings, and the eyes of Ingrid Nyeboe, whom she married the year after.

I’ve known Ingrid for a very long time, because I knew writer and critic Jill Johnston, her spouse of 30 years. But one of the things I never noticed until Jill died and I went to various memorials and events that Ingrid had organized was that Ingrid’s eyes are this Danish blue. I was really struck by that. I mean you do look in your lover’s eyes, right? I’m in my early 70s, and I do think about my mortality: how much time do I have left to paint, what am I going to look at, what do I want to do with my time to make it rich and continue to make it rich? So all of those things take on a poignancy that I think, as a young person, I may not have had—I may have noticed her blue eyes, but I don’t think I would have integrated it the way I have.

Fishman’s usual ratio of cardinal elements has been reversed—little clods of earthy pigment get caught up in a centrifuge of light, water & atmosphere.

I see a theatricality in the new paintings, which comes from a number of things, for example, the grandness of opera... but I felt there was a spirituality and humanness, a humane-ness, a compassion, a connection with paint that was about compassion.

I was working on about three or four paintings and I was getting very upset because there was this odd theatricality about them and there was also, this quality of everything moving up and out, explosively. And I was very critical of it because I tend to be very formal. One day I just happened to look across at this one painting, which is now called “Assunta” and I thought, what is this? Next to it there was a postcard of Titian’s “Assumption.” And I looked and I thought, for Christ’s sake, it's all about Venice, it’s all about this drama in these paintings. And it’s about the sky. So it all came to me and it was a tremendous relief.

Being a painter, making paintings, continues to evolve.

One thing I will not do is make paintings that don’t teach me something. I often destroy something—not destroy it and throw it away, but scrape it down or repaint it or something, unless it really does something that’s like, “Oh!” and teaches me something.

Every time I go somewhere, I notice something visual, and it ends up ultimately in the work. Esther Newton, a former lover of mine, and an esteemed cultural anthropologist, wrote a paper on consciousness-raising in which she compared it to religious conversion theory.

“‘Always Wild At Heart’ – an Interview with Louise Fishman.” Yeast – Art of Sharing. Die Plattform Zum Thema Teilen Und Teilhabe., http://www.yeast-art-of-sharing.de/kunst/always-wild-at-heart-an-interview-with-louise-fishman/. Accessed 8 Dec. 2021.

Butler, Sharon L. “LOUISE FISHMAN with Sharon Butler – The Brooklyn Rail.” The Brooklyn Rail, https://brooklynrail.org, 4 Oct. 2012, https://brooklynrail.org/2012/10/art/louise-fishman-with-sharon-butler.

Greenberger, Alex. “Louise Fishman Dead: Abstract Painter Dies at 82 – ARTnews.Com.” ARTnews.Com, ARTnews.com, 26 July 2021, https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/louise-fishman-painter-dead-1234599995/.

Moyer, Carrie. “A Restless Spirit – ARTnews.Com.” ARTnews.Com, ARTnews.com, 2 Oct. 2012, https://www.artnews.com/art-in-america/features/a-restless-spirit-62951/.

#Louise Fishman #Ingrid Nyeboe #Esther Newton #lesbian art and artists #lesbian abstract art #intersectionality with Judaism #the amazons #anger #calligraphy #blue

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chiseler · 3 years

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The House of D

As one of his final acts in office, Mayor Jimmy Walker broke ground in 1932 for the New York City House of Detention for Women, built on the site of the old Jefferson Market jail in Greenwich Village and colloquially known as the House of D. According to sociologist Sara Harris’ Hellhole (on John Waters’ list of recommended reading), It was intended as a model of prison reform. Opened in 1934, the twelve-story monolith of brownish brick with art deco flourishes loomed behind the old Jefferson Market courthouse on Sixth Avenue, looking more like a stylish if somewhat cheerless apartment building than a prison. Windows were meshed instead of barred, and the one sign on its exterior merely gave the address, “Number Ten Greenwich Avenue.” There were toilets and hot and cold running water in all four hundred cells, and it was going to focus on rehabilitating its inmates – prostitutes, vagrants, alcoholics and/or drug addicts – rather than merely punishing them. From the start the reality was at variance with the intentions, and the facility quickly became infamous as a combination of Bedlam and Bastille. Within a decade it was chronically overcrowded with a volatile mix of inmates: women who couldn’t make bail awaiting trials that were sometimes months off, women already convicted and serving time, alcoholics and addicts, the mentally ill, violent lesbian tops, street gang girls, hookers and other lifelong multiple offenders, and teenagers spending their first nights behind bars. Tougher, more experienced prisoners brutalized and sexually assaulted the weak and inexperienced. So, of course, did the staff. The halls rang with the howls of inmates suffering the agonies of drug or alcohol withdrawal. There were cockroaches and mice in the cells and worms in the food. Village lesbians called it the Country Club and the Snake Pit. The IWW organizer Elizabeth Gurley Flynn did time in the House of D, as did accused spy Ethel Rosenberg and Warhol shooter Valerie Solanas. In 1957, Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker movement, spent thirty days there for staying on the street during a civil defense air raid drill. Her ban-the-bomb supporters picketed outside every day from noon to two; the Times called them “possibly the most peaceful pickets in the city.”

Despite its bland exterior, the House of D made its presence very known in the neighborhood through the daily ritual of inmates yelling out the windows or down from the exercise area on the roof to the boyfriends, girlfriends, dealers and pimps perpetually loitering on the Greenwich Avenue sidewalk – a carnivalesque Village tradition for almost forty years. Waters first caught the spectacle in the early 1960s. “It was amazing. No one can ever imagine what that was like. All the hookers would be screaming out the windows, ‘Hey Jimbo!’ And all the pimps would be down on the sidewalk yelling stuff.” Writer and film producer Jeremiah Newton initially encountered it at around the same time. “It was this huge, monolithic building, looking like the building the Morlocks dragged the Time Machine into, and the girls were always yelling down, screaming obscenities and throwing things out the window. It was the biggest building there. I sat on a stoop watching the people walk by. I’d never seen anything quite like it before.” The Village writer Grace Paley lived near the facility in the 1950s and 1960s, and walked her kids past it regularly. She wrote that “we would often have to thread our way through whole families calling up – bellowing, screaming up to the third, seventh, tenth floor, to figures, shadows behind bars and screened windows, How you feeling? Here’s Glena. She got big. Mami mami, you like my dress? We gettin you out baby. New lawyer come by.”

Women arrested at antiwar rallies during the Vietnam era found themselves locked up in the House of D with the hookers, junkies, crazies and butch lesbians. On Saturday, February 20 1965, two eighteen-year-old college students, Lisa Goldrosen of Bard and Andrea Dworkin of Bennington, were arrested during an antiwar protest at the UN and sent to the House of D. There, they later testified, they were brutally mistreated and humiliated by male doctors “examining” them for venereal diseases, and forced constantly to fend off the rough advances of other inmates. They were not allowed to use a telephone until Monday. That March, the New York Post ran an exposé based on their testimony. They didn’t experience anything other women hadn’t for thirty years by then, but in the 1960s those other inmates were overwhelmingly poor black and Hispanic women. Dworkin and Goldrosen were white, middle-class college coeds. As so often happens, that’s what it took to generate public outrage.

When Grace Paley herself was arrested at another war protest some months later, she was detained in the facility. Conditions had slightly improved in light of the outcry the Post had stirred up. Paley had been arrested before at antiwar protests, but it had always resulted in at worst overnight stays. This time a judge threw the book at her and gave her six days. “He thought I was old enough to know better,” she later wrote, “a forty-five year old woman, a mother and teacher. I ought to be too busy to waste time on causes I couldn’t possibly understand.” At least she could look out her cell window and watch her kids walking to school.

In October 1970, Angela Davis was arrested in the Howard Johnson Motor Lodge at Eighth Avenue and Fifty-First Street and taken to the House of D. It was not her first time in Greenwich Village. She was born in 1944 in Birmingham, Alabama, where her father was a car mechanic and her mother was a teacher and a civil rights activist. They lived in a black neighborhood called Dynamite Hill because the Klan had firebombed so many homes there. With help from the American Friends, she and her mother moved to New York, where her mother studied for her Masters at NYU while Angela attended Elisabeth Irwin High School in the Village. She went on to study philosophy at Brandeis, the Sorbonne, and at the University of California, earning her Ph.D. One of her teachers was Herbert Marcuse. By the late 1960s she was an avowed Communist, a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and affiliated with the Black Panthers. She lectured in philosophy at UCLA until 1969, when her Communist and radical affiliations got her fired.

In August of 1970 a black teen named Jonathan Jackson took over a Marin County courtroom and demanded the release of his older brother, Panther member George Jackson, from nearby Soledad prison. He took the judge, the district attorney and three jurors hostage. In the attempted getaway, Jackson, the judge and one other person were shot and killed. When police discovered that Davis, who knew George Jackson, was the registered owner of Jonathan’s weapon, she was charged as an accomplice to murder, a capital crime in California. She fled the state, which put her on the FBI’s most wanted list. A beautiful twenty-six-year-old with a huge and magnificent Afro, she became a global pop star of the revolution a la Che Guevara. When the FBI arrested her she’d spent a few days walking openly in Times Square, unrecognized because she’d slicked down the Afro and dressed like an office worker.

Within thirty minutes of her being locked up in the House of D a crowd of protesters began to gather outside the monolith, chanting; prisoners stood in their windows and chanted along, their fists raised. The NYPD sent a Tactical Defense Force unit – riot police – and House of D officials turned off all the lights inside, hoping to quiet things down. Instead, women set small fires in their cells, and demonstrators cheered the flickerings in the windows. They dispersed without major incident. Placed in isolation, Davis went on a ten-day hunger strike. She spent nine weeks in the facility while fighting extradition to California, where, she was quite convinced, she’d be convicted and put to death. In fact she would be acquitted of all charges in a San Francisco courtroom in 1972, after spending eighteen months behind bars.

Davis was the facility’s last celebrity tenant. Through the 1950s and 1960s, Greenwich Village civic and neighborhood groups had constantly called for the facility to be removed to some location more appropriate, which is to say far away from where they lived and walked their children to school. More liberal souls in the neighborhood thought it should stay, fearing that if the women were shifted to some more isolated location they might be all the more easily mistreated. Before he wrote the hit Broadway musicals Hello, Dolly! and La Cage aux Folles, Villager Jerry Herman wrote a satirical revue called Parade, which included a song about the House of D controversy:

Don’t tear down the House of Detention

Keep her and shield her from all who wish her harm

Don’t tear down the House of Detention

Cornerstone of Greenwich Village charm…

So I say fie, fie to the cynic

Know that there’s love in these hallowed walls of brown

There’s love in the laundry, there’s love in the showers,

There’s love in the clinic

'Twas built with love, my lovely house in town

Save the tramp, the pusher and the souse

Would you trade love for an apartment house?

Dworkin and Goldrosen’s testimony before a commission studying conditions at the House of D helped lead to its being shut down in 1971. Inmates were moved to a new facility on Rikers Island. After some debate about possible new uses for the Village monolith, it was simply torn down in 1973. The site is now a small, fenced-in garden. In 1974 Tom Eyen’s spoofy play Women Behind Bars, set in the House of D in the 1950s, premiered. John Waters’ star Divine performed in a later production.

by John Strausbaugh

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i-am-very-very-tired · 3 years

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Let’s get one thing straight: Body-shaming someone is never OK, even if the target is a public figure. However, despite the fact that this should be a universal rule of decorum, people are still prone to criticizing the appearances of others, including those of celebrities.Although social media has shone a bright light on the issue in recent years, celebrity body-shaming is nothing new. Since the rise of gossip magazines, stars have had their bodies scrutinized for all the world to see. From critics saying Gigi Hadid is too skinny for the runway to onlookers rudely commenting on Tyra Banks's swimsuit body, it seems no celebrity is totally immune to the plague of judgment and unnecessary remarks.Pregnancy rumors, comments about weight gain, and bullying for clothing choices all fall under the tasteless domain of all that encompasses body-shaming — and it happens even more often than you may think. But that doesn’t stop most of these stars from living their best lives and even taking some time to teach these trolls a lesson or two, when they're in the right mood for it. Below are 17 times celebrities have experienced body-shaming, either before their time in the spotlight or while living directly in it. Gigi Hadid Supermodel Gigi Hadid is no stranger to having her body commented on by the public. Some people have accused the model of being too thin while others have said she’s too curvy for the runway. Despite these comments, Hadid stresses that she loves her body and that shamers should mind their own business. It’s not their body, after all. Demi Lovato Growing up in the spotlight is no easy task for anyone. Demi Lovato has dealt with body-shamers since her days as a Disney star and still faces unwanted comments about the way she looks regularly. Most recently, people came after the singer for supposedly gaining weight while in rehab and used a paparazzi photo to tear the singer apart. Thankfully, Lovato isn’t afraid to stand up for herself and has a history of taking people down when they make negative comments. Selena Gomez Like Lovato, Selena Gomez grew up in the spotlight and has subsequently suffered years of body shaming at the hands of "fans" and haters alike. In 2015, the actress and singer opened up about how she sought therapy after being body-shamed publicly. Most recently, Gomez clapped back at fans who commented on a photo of her wearing a bikini on Instagram. Jennifer Aniston Jennifer Aniston has also experienced some body-shaming. The former Friends actress once wrote an empowering essay for HuffPost in 2016 about being “fed up” over ridiculous rumors and unwarranted comments about her body. During this time, gossip magazines were speculating that Aniston was pregnant because her stomach "looked bloated" in a few photos. The actress set the record straight while simultaneously destroying the idea that people’s bodies are something that should be critiqued. Tyra Banks “Kiss my fat ass.” That’s the iconic and unforgettable response that queen Tyra Banks had for body-shamers in 2007 after tabloids captioned a photo of her in her swimsuit with cruel phrases, and it seems she's sticking with it. Kelly Clarkson Kelly Clarkson has dealt with body-shamers, as well. In 2017, a Twitter troll tweeted that the American Idol winner was fat. Clarkson responded, “...and still fucking awesome,” proving she is not here for any type of comments on her body. This wasn't Clarkson's first troll, either. In 2015, British media personality Katie Hopkins had the nerve to comment that Clarkson had gained weight, to which she responded by saying this wasn’t the first time she’s been attacked for the way she looks. Clarkson also said she’d rather have wine than waste any time thinking about shamers. Same, girl. Adele Adele has faced years of disgusting comments about her body since her intro to stardom in 2006. Nevertheless, the clap-back queen makes sure to shut down instances of body-shaming immediately. But that doesn’t mean words don’t hurt. In a 2015 interview, Adele mentioned that while she does sometimes

struggle with her body image, she tries not to let it rule her life. America Ferrera For her 33rd birthday, America Ferrera wrote a letter to her body. She shared the body-positive message on Instagram, saying she’s finally learned to love her body after years of harboring feelings of negativity towards it. However, people are still commenting on Ferrera’s body. In fact, Ferrera has famously said that she didn’t know she was ugly or fat until she starred in the show Ugly Betty, which says a lot about the way people treat public figures. Chrissy Teigen Twitter phenomenon and multitalented model Chrissy Teigen has often been the subject of judgmental comments. In fact, Teigen was body-shamed at the 2018 Emmy Awards, with trolls talking about her weight post-pregnancy with son Miles. Teigen sarcastically responded to the trolls in her typical hilarious tone by showing them she has no time to be shamed for her body. Lady Gaga Body-shamers have come after Mother Monster, too. Lady Gaga, who has been open about her struggle with chronic illness, has had her image picked apart since appearing on the scene with her 2008 hit “Just Dance.” Trolls also had something to say after her 2017 Super Bowl halftime performance. Of course, the ever-busy superstar didn’t have time for such nonsense and quickly responded that she loves her body. Alicia Silverstone Clueless star Alicia Silverstone saw her career take off in the '90s, but stardom didn’t come without a slew of critics picking apart the actor's appearance. When it was announced that Silverstone would play Batgirl in the then-upcoming film Batman & Robin, the actress was met with an onslaught of hateful comments about her body. In an Entertainment Weekly article from 1996, it’s noted that fashion critics said Silverstone looked “more Babe than babe,” referring to the fictional pig. The actor later recalled that paparazzi chased her down in an airport chanting “fat girl” to the Batman theme song. Rihanna Rihanna has also been attacked for the way her body looks. After her 2018 Grammy performance (which she slayed, by the way), trolls came after Rihanna for her apparent weight gain, speculating that the singer might be pregnant. This isn’t even the first time Rihanna has faced such criticism. In 2017, the Fenty Beauty founder shut haters down with a Gucci Mane meme (in which she showed two photos of rapper Gucci Mane, from 2007 and 2017, and captioned the meme "If you can’t handle me at my 2007 Gucci Mane, you don’t deserve me at my 2017 Gucci Mane"), proving that body-shaming her or anyone else will not be tolerated. Serena Williams Serena Williams is one of the greatest tennis players of all time. Yet the 23-time Grand Slam champion has had her body scrutinized countless times for being "too muscular." Although the tennis champion says such comments have hurt her feelings, she also says that she's now more confident than ever about her body and calls it her “weapon.” Jennifer Lawrence Jennifer Lawrence says that when she was beginning her career, people in the film industry shamed her for "being fat.” According to the actor, she was once told she would be fired if she didn’t lose weight. Kate Winslet Before she landed her lead role in Titanic, Kate Winslet says the kids at her school would bully her for the way she looked. The actor opened up about being body-shamed by her fellow classmates, who called her “blubber” and told her she was too ugly to be an actress. However, Winslet never gave up on her dreams and has since spoken out against body-shaming, saying that she had to ignore the negative comments to be the person she is today. Drew Barrymore The lovable Drew Barrymore faced her own harassment in the '90s over the way her body looked onscreen. During this time, Barrymore often had her “baby fat” criticized in reviews. In a 2010 interview, the actor says she was often bullied for her weight when she was younger. More recently, the actress has had to refute pregnancy rumors over the way her stomach looks on TV. Renée Zellweger It seems Ren´ee Zellweger

can’t please the critics (nor should she have to). Since gaining weight for her role in the early-2000s film Bridget Jones's Diary, Zellweger’s weight has been a subject of contention for body-shamers everywhere. Some people think she’s too skinny, while others think she’s too fat. Nevertheless, Zellweger isn’t here for tabloids that want to critique her body. The actress wrote an article for HuffPost in 2016 after people commented on her rumored cosmetic surgery, proving once and for all that her body isn’t for public consumption or criticism.

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