#video essayists feel like the former

[neroushalvaus]

Okay I am going to use the Somerton situation to talk about something that is very important to me. Following the discussion I have seen former Somerton fans being disappointed in themselves and questioning how they can ever trust another video essayist again. I have also seen some people being smug because to them Somerton was obviously unreliable from the start. As a person who also saw the "red flags" in Somerton, I would like to skip the smugness and talk a bit about what the red flags were to me.

Someone else has probably posted something similar and Hbomberguy's & Todd in the Shadows's videos touched a few of these points, but they didn't focus on them or how to spot these things. I think it is a good thing: I think it would have reinforced the idea that Somerton's fans were to blame for being lied to, and these youtubers didn't want to pin any blame on the fans. Also, some of the things I'm going to talk about were not by any means proof of him being unreliable, they were common tropes I personally associate with people who are bullshitting on internet. Think of it as something like spotting terfs: If you consider following a tumblr user and find out they have at some point posted "males will always be a danger to females no matter what they say", it is very possible that they are not a terf. Maybe they were having a bad day and were just wording their post badly – But you should probably search "trans" from their blog before following them, just to be sure.

So, the tropes in James Somerton's content that I consider red flags:

Lack of sources. This one may seem obvious and Hbomb talked about this in his video, but the lack of sources in his videos was outrageous. Video essays are called essays for a reason, they are not supposed to be just a guy talking about whatever comes to his mind, they should be well researched essays. Obviously video essays should contain one's own thoughts and interpretations and those do not need citations. But James Somerton didn't come out of the womb knowing everything about LGBT history, Disney and film theory, if he actually knew something about all this stuff, he should have learnt it from somewhere. There should be sources he could point to. It is very common that even when a video essayist doesn't tell you where they got all their information, they open their video by saying stuff like "when I prepared for this video I read the book Also sprach Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche and this one thrilling blog post about lesbian cruising in 1960s Sweden". From what I've seen, James does not really do this. From watching his videos you could arrive to the conclusion that James Somerton does not read any books, he just knows everything. There are situations where people don't feel the need to add sources, like when the information is considered common knowledge or when the topic relates heavily to the essayist's actual academic field or profession. This is okay and very understandable, but can sometimes be dangerous, since if the video essayist markets himself as a marketing specialist, people are more likely to take his word for stuff that has to do with marketing, even without sources. It is understandable that in many situations an essayist may think "why should I cite a source? I know this thing!", but doing your research well is partly about checking if the information you are certain of is actually true. Also, as Hbomb pointed out, if you can cite a source, your audience can go learn more about the subject. It's not about anyone doubting you know your stuff, it's about learning. That's why well-respected video essayists usually cite their sources very clearly.

Lack of pictures and screenshots. This is about different kinds of sources again, many things on this list are kind of about sources. An example: When James Somerton made a video about JKR, he mentioned something about Rowling at one time saying that trans students in 30-50Feralhogs (or whatever the wizard school is called) could use magic to present as their gender. If this was any other video essayist, you'd expect a tweet to pop up, or something else confirming Rowling ever said this. Nothing pops up, obviously because Rowling didn't say this, but you can't see anything fishy in that because things rarely pop up in Somerton's videos. He doesn't show you court documents when speaking about a court case, he doesn't show you the comments apparently mad at him for implying the gay anime is gay when he is complaining about people being mad at him. There is a reason people show screenshots and tweets in video essays. When a good video essayist says JK Rowling has tweeted that all people who menstruate should be referred to as women, the video essayist shows the tweet so people know they are not making it up. If there were hoards of annoying bitc-- I mean, angry white women whining about gay sex in HuffPost articles or Somerton's youtube comments, he should have no trouble showing you those. Remember that you should not trust someone just because they show you pictures or screenshots. Pictures can be photoshopped, screenshots can be doctored. Many youtubers are aware that you listen to their videos while cleaning or while walking your dog and don't actually see the screen all the time, and some may take advantage of that by saying something like "and here she threatened to kill me" while showing a text message where someone said "die mad about it". A screenshot alone isn't much but you should demand to see the screenshot.

Passive voice. I am once again bitching about this. Somerton repeatedly says things like "it's been said that" or "it was common knowledge that" or "a legend says that" or "according to most interpretations". He doesn't say who says it, making it very hard to fact check and that seems to be his goal in some cases.

Relying heavily on anecdotes. Writing a dense, analytical video about film theory or history can be exhausting and you may want to pepper in little fun facts. However Somerton seemed to rely on these heavily; he can't just talk about how he has totally bought every lie told by The Pink Swastika, he also needs to tell a cute little anecdote about SS men forcing sexual favours out of men. He can't just tell a story about a court case, he needs to add in ridiculous stuff about the jury booing. This is what I mean by not all the things on this list being necessarily proof of someone being unreliable. Many people use anecdotes and little stories in their storytelling, it makes the videos flow better and it's hard to decide which anecdotes are valid and which are not. A source obviously makes an anecdote a bit more believable, but here are some things that instantly make me fact check an anecdote:

It's a bit too convenient, poetic or ironic. Sometimes real life is weirder than fiction but if an anecdote is "perfect" and has an amazing punchline and you could write twelve poems about it, there is a possibility it was invented by pop science books.

It assumes your political enemies are stupid. Dunking on conservatives, MRAs and transphobes is always fun and after you've seen a lot of this kind of content it's easy to believe anything about these people. You must resist the impulse to believe everything that may make your opponents look stupid.

The person telling the anecdote implies it is an example of a larger, systemic problem. You know what's worse than taking a random happenstance from human history or internet and basing an entire political theory on it? The said random happenstance being made up. You should in general be wary of people telling one story and explaining why it's an example of everything that's wrong in the world. We live in a huge world. You can always find a white woman who loves cute gays but hates the idea of Nick Heartstopper and Charlie Heartstopper getting nasty but that doesn't mean it's an indicator of a larger issue.

Simplifying complex issues. We all know that "only the boring gays survived the AIDS crisis, and that's why gays started to only care about marriage equality and military" is a horrible, insensitive thing to say, but you also have to think about it for like two seconds to realize that it can't be correct. It kind of reminds me of the "roe v wade caused the crime drop of 1990s" claim in Freakonomics. It sounds logical and simple, like a basic math calculation. Societal issues rarely are like that, though. You should never believe anyone who tells you about a huge societal shift and says it happened because of one thing and one thing only.

These were some of the things I noticed in Somerton's content that caused me to distrust him. I hope these were helpful to you and feel free to add your own "red flags" if you feel like it!

[the-kestrels-feather]

I know I'm SO late to the party, but In light of the hbomberguy video, I wanted to drop a list of some of my favorite video essayists on here who are all great. Some are well known, some of them not, but all deserve a lot of love thrown their way!

Any creators I know are Queer will have a * next to their names if that's what you're looking for! (Note some of them might not have a star that should, that's not me trying to invalidate anybody I just didn't know, please feel free to correct me!)

Dominic Noble- book content! Has a series called Lost in Adaptation that judges how faithful movie adaptations of books were to their original source material, but also does some reviews/summaries as well. Very publicly denounced JKR after she was revealed to be a TERF and stated he will no longer review anything by her on his channel. Also deleted ALL of his HP videos after finding out she was a TERF (which were his most popular videos), so I have a really deep respect for him tbh. Former Channel Awesome member who publicly denounced them on several occasions, and an all around swell guy.

*Overly Sarcastic Productions- channel run by 2 people who go by Red and Blue. History and Mythology/Literature content, as well as analysis of tropes and media! I've been told their History content can be a bit... Iffy, but I'm not a Historian so I don't know, however if they get something wrong they're good about correcting it for what that counts for. Very interesting to listen to, I've watched Red's Videos roughly 100 times each. Also has a podcast.

*Strange Aeons- fandom/Tumblr history mostly, as well as some history, and weird businesses too. Reads a LOT of cursed content for her channel.

*Lindsay Ellis- Media/film analysis. obviously not as unknown as some of the others on here, but I absolutely adore her content and will forever be sad that she isn't on YouTube anymore.

Cruel World Happy Mind- MLM/explanation of controversial figures. I'm not sure how best to explain her content, but she seems genuinely lovely and is interesting to listen to. Also a victim of Illuminaughtii's ire and deserves some love. The video she made on Blair is a bit outdated since she made it at the start of when this all came to light, but imo it's definitely worth a watch. Her talking about her interaction with Blair genuinely broke my heart.

*Night Mind- Analog horror/Unfiction/ARG content! Analyzes and explains various internet horror pieces, and also has a very nice voice to listen to.

*Lola Sebastian- Film/Media Analysis!

Li Speaks- Deep dives into various nostalgia, mainly flash games!

*Princess Weekes- Media/film/literary analysis!

abitfrank- summaries and analysis of various "darker" children's content such as Coraline (book and movie), Nightmare Before Christmas, and various dark fairy tales

Hello Future Me- writing advice and world building information!

Curious Archive- deep dives into the various bestiaries of video games and the animals in real life that they're similar to, I love his Subnautica video!

In Praise of Shadows- Horror media analysis! Will often focus on specific franchises, but also covers things like horror comics and tropes as well.

Wait in the Wings- theatre! Deep dives into the back stories behind the production of various musicals! His video on Rogers the Musical that he did for April Fool's last year is comedy fucking gold

Weird Reads With Emily Louise- conspiracy theory/cult/weird thing analysis! Looks at things from an objective and skeptical view, and is very in depth. Recently served as a consulting producer on an HBO Max documentary on the Love has Won cult.

Ask a Mortician- death content! Covers various historical events and darker stories of death from the view of a Mortician.

*Izzzyzz- deep dives into fandoms, as well as well as different video games and kids' virtual worlds.

Disney Dan- Disney content! Covers the history of different mascot costumes at Disney and Disney-like parks! Has collaborated with Definctland in the past too!

Yesterworld- theme park content! Discusses history behind rides and parks, as well as some Disney movies. I think has also collaborated with Defunctland and Disney Dan?

Legal Eagle- legal content! Breaks down news about ongoing legal cases in a way that feels approachable. I like him because both my parents are paralegals and his videos have helped me understand what they mean when they're talking about work a little bit

Super Eye patch Wolf- media video essays! Mostly about anime/manga and video games, but also covers things like influencer scams and pro wrestling. His "what the internet did to Garfield" video is SO GOOD

*Jessie Gender- Media Analysis, loves Star Trek

*Laura Crone- Media Analysis video essays, her videos on the Swan Princess are fucking great I highly recommend!

*Lady Emily- Media Analysis, did a whole video on Spuder-Man turn off the dark that is SO good. Co writer for Sarah Z

Tale Foundry- covers different forms of fiction, their xenofiction video is great, as is their Angelarium one!

Defunctland- Theme Park ride and Children's TV History channel!

Jenny Nicholson- one of the sort of "big three" commentary channels with Lindsay Ellis and Sarah Z imo, covers all sorts of stuff but her most recent one is a 3 hour video on the theme park Evermore Park!

*Sarah Z- Fandom history and Media analysis! I really enjoy their content, the Johnlock Conspiracy and DashCon videos are my favorites!

Li Speaks- Flash games/virtual world analysis mostly! She has a very soothing voice to listen to, if you played like. Any MMOs or virtual worlds growing up I Highly recommend. I've watched her video on Horseland SO many times.

*Codex Entry- Video game coverage! Her videos on Pathologic are great if you're like me and wanted more after the Hbomberguy video!

Wendigoon- ARG/Spooky content! One of the early proponents of the Mandela Catalog and best known for his conspiracy theory iceberg, but has also covered things like various weird/unsolved crimes, Assassination conspiracies, and other things. His videos on Faith, Blood Meridian, The Mandela Catalog, and his Religion/Cult iceberg are some of my favorites

Dino Diego- Dinosaur fiction, like movies, video games, books, short stories, etc. his 2 videos on West of Eden and Winter in Eden are two of my favorites!

Haley Whipjack- I don't know how to describe her content really? She does a lot of deep dives (her Shrek one is my favorite), currently doing a recap of Once Upon a Time by season that is very fun. She's an elementary school teacher by day (that's not me dozing her she talks about it on her channel), and so she has fun unhinged teacher energy!

Other channels that are a sort of collection of different people talking about different things rather than 1 or 2:

TEDx

PBS

The Exploring Series

[kirnet]

There’s nothing wrong with people talking abt being former fans of somerton and feeling cheated and betrayed abt the plagiarism, as they should! And I understand that it’s incredibly emotionally devastating to have someone that you looked up to and trusted revealed as a thieving fraud. But I keep these people say “I watched a lot of his content.” Content. Like yeah, it is content. It’s hollow and shallow and there’s nothing else behind it. That’s kind of the problem isn���t it, that he just wanted to make content instead of a video, an essay, a film, art.

These people are not wrong by any means and I sincerely wish them the best, but I just can’t help but wonder how the whole “content” thing played into it. We call everything online content now. We consume content. I hate it! When I paint, I don’t create content, I create a painting. My backlog of art isn’t content, it’s a body of work. Is calling stuff content making us create more shallow art, or are we describing the rise of more shallow and commercial art as content? Idk, I’m not a video essayist who’s comfortable treating my raw observations as concrete fact with no supporting evidence.

[kuiperoid]

An Ode to Abandoned Theses

[originally posted here]

Having the opportunity to study in a Master’s Program is so often treated like the pinnacle of opportunity. Suddenly, one has the access, funding, and resources to study whatever incredibly niche topic your heart so desires. Just make sure it is something you are actually able to do.

Wait, what?

So many go into graduate school deeply passionate about some topic. A Master’s Degree sounds so much more elegant and refined than a Bachelor's Degree. The purpose is not merely taking some classes, but to focus on a thesis topic. Some need to start the program to select a thesis, while others have a topic selected even before their undergraduate years began. There is great excitement in knowing that one can truly focus in on a hyper-specific topic more involved than one’s undergraduate years permitted, whether or not a Capstone project was a part of it. It sounds so very free.

However, upon starting one’s thesis, the assumption of freedom slowly disappears. So often, one is hindered by access. Naturally, citing one’s sources and being as accurate as possible is deeply important at this level. Students are blessed with free access to academic papers the way that the general public is not. However, secondary to accuracy in importance is originality. No amount of access to already-written academic journals can create that originality, which is where the difficulty in access stems. From here, students must go out and do their own research, travel to locations to take measurements and make observations, conduct interviews, or contact other researchers for their data depending on what the study involves.

Suddenly, the limitations become all too apparent. Attempts to reach out to others for their input is sometimes met with radio silence. Time constraints force projects to reduce scale. Common refrains aimed at projects deemed too ambitious include “that sounds more like a PhD-level project” or even “maybe you can do this when you become a professor.” It feels like being trapped in a multi-level marketing scheme with more prestige attached and, depending on the institution, state funding.

If one is fortunate, these realizations come early on, perhaps before one’s proposal has even been made. However, this is not always the case. Sometimes projects have already been well under way, a large portion of the preliminary research already completed. Only upon moving to the next step are the limitations revealed. A pinnacle piece of research proves unattainable. A slew of potential interviewees do not respond. The final potential member of one’s committee, the one specifically sought for their particular expertise, points out all of the holes in the premise. Suddenly a thesis project that felt nearly complete falls apart. 

Finding a new topic is not necessarily too difficult. In any given academic’s mind, there are plenty of topics for projects floating around, some more attainable than others. The problem then is not even “what will my new thesis topic be?” so much as “what do I do with all of this now?” There may very well be a PhD or professor research topic, depending on one’s life goals or why the project was rejected to begin with. Perhaps it can be turned into the basis for a special lecture or a thinkpiece for the opinion section of a newspaper. One recalls how many video essayists are current or former academics. Perhaps some of their famous video essays are abandoned theses. One would hate to see all of that time spent on research and all of that knowledge gained go to waste. 

[innuendostudios]

The newest installment of The Alt-Right Playbook - Endnote 4: How the Alt-Right is Like an Abusive Relationship - is a little different. This installment was presented live at Solidarity Lowell, and includes a bonus Q&A section. This video expands on the ideas put forth in How to Radicalize a Normie.

If you would like more videos like this to come out, please back me on Patreon.

Transcript below the cut.

He is intriguing, yet unpredictable. He demands unconditional loyalty. He seems to have an intuitive understanding of what people want to hear but no actual empathy; he treats others as simply bodies or objects. And he’s surrounded by a network of subordinates but the personnel is always changing.

Does it sound like I’m describing The President? Because these are, according to Alexandra Stein, qualities of a cult leader.

Hi. My name is Ian Danskin. I’m a video essayist and media artist. I run the YouTube channel Innuendo Studios, the flagship endeavor of which is currently The Alt-Right Playbook, a series on the political and rhetorical strategies the Alt-Right uses to legitimize itself and gain power. And, if that sounds interesting to you, and you haven’t already, please like share and subscribe.

The most recent episode of The Alt-Right Playbook is about how people get recruited into these largely online reactionary communities like the Alt-Right, a subject which, as it turns out, is real fuckin’ hard to research.

What I want to talk about with you today is how I go about studying a population that is incredibly hostile towards being studied. It involves finding the bits and pieces of the Alt-Right that we do have data on - the pockets of good research, the outsider observations, the stories of lived experience - as well as looking at older movements the Alt-Right grew out of, that have been extensively researched, and spotting the ways the Alt-Right is continuous with them, and trying to extrapolate how those structures might recreate themselves in the social media age.

So it’s… a lot. And, in the process of researching, I found a wealth of interesting perspectives that, by focusing the video on recruitment specifically, I barely dipped a toe in. All that stuff is what I’d like to get into with you today. But I’m trying to thread a needle here: you don’t need to have seen my video, How to Radicalize a Normie, to follow this talk, but, if you have seen it already, I will try not to be redundant. This talk is one part making my case for why I think the conclusions in that video are correct, one part repository for all the stuff I couldn’t get into, and one part how I’ve come to look at the Alt-Right as a result of this research, including some pet theories I wouldn’t feel right claiming as truth without further research, but I do think are on the right track.

This talk is called Isolation, Engulfment, and Pain: How the Alt-Right is Like an Abusive Relationship. We’re going to cover a lot of ground, from information processing to emotional development, but we’re necessarily also going to cover racism and violence and abuse dynamics. So this is an introduction and a content warning: if some of these subjects are particularly charged for you, no offense will be taken if you at any point leave the room. I have to research this stuff for a living, and it is rough, and sometimes I have to step away. We don’t judge here.

Now. Requisite dash of self-deprecation: don’t give me too much credit for all this. I am proud of the work I do and I think I’m genuinely good at it, but much of this video was compiling the work of others. Besides research I had already done and my own observations, the video had 27 sources: three books, five research papers, six articles, one leaked document, three testimonials, four videos, four pages of statistics, and one Twitter joke. I also spoke to four professional researchers who study right-wing extremism and one former Alt-Righter.

Without all their hard work, I would have nothing to compile.

OK? Let’s begin.

We’re gonna center on those three main texts: Alt-America by David Neiwert, a history of the Alt-Right’s origins; Healing from Hate by Michael Kimmel, about how young men get into (and out of) extremist groups, be they neo-Nazi or jihadist; and Terror, Love and Brainwashing by Alexandra Stein, about how people are courted by and kept inside cults and totalitarian regimes.

I began with Kimmel. The premise of Healing from Hate is that extremist groups tend to be between 75 and 90% male, and that you cannot understand radical conservatism without looking at it through the lens of toxic masculinity. Which makes it all the more disappointing that Kimmel has been accused by multiple women of bullying and harassment. I found the book incredibly useful, and we’re still going to talk about it, I just need to caveat here that retweets are not endorsements. Also, if I spoil the book for you then you don’t need to buy it, give your money to someone who isn’t a creep.

Kimmel’s argument is that extremism begins with a pain peculiar to young men. He calls it “aggrieved entitlement.” I call it Durden Syndrome. You know that scene in Fight Club where Tyler Durden says, “We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires and movie gods and rockstars, but we won’t, we’re slowly learning that fact, and we are very, very pissed off”? Yeah, that. As men, the world promised us something, and the promise wasn’t kept.

Some men skew towards social progressivism when they realize this promise was never made to women, or men of color, or queer or trans or nonbinary people, and recognize the injustice of that. Some men skew towards economic leftism when they realize that every cishet white man being a millionaire rockstar movie god is mathematically impossible. But they skew towards reactionary conservatism when they feel the promise should have been kept. That’s the life they were supposed to have, and someone took it from them.

Hate groups appeal to that sense of emasculation. “You wanna feel like a Real Man? Shave off your hair, dance to hatecore, and let’s beat the crap out of someone.” Kimmel notes that the greatest indicator someone will join a hate group is a broken home: divorce, foster care, parents with addictions, physical or sexual abuse. The greater the distance between the life they were promised and the life they are living, the more enticing Real Masculinity becomes. Their fellow extremists are brothers, the leaders father figures.

The group does give them someone to blame for their lot in life - immigrants, feminists, the Jewish conspiracy - but that’s not why they join. They’re after empowerment. According to Kimmel, “Their embrace of neo-Nazi ideology is a consequence of their recruitment and indoctrination process, not its cause."

But once an Other has been identified as the locus of a hate group’s hate, new recruits are brought along when the group terrorizes that Other. Events like cross burnings and street fights are dangerous and morally fraught, and are often traumatic for a new recruit. And experiencing an emotional or physical trauma can create an intense bond with the people experiencing it with him, even though they’re the ones who brought him to the traumatic event in the first place. The creation of this bond is one of the reasons some hate groups usher new recruits out into the field as early as possible: the sooner they are emotionally invested in the community, the faster they will embrace the community’s politics.

This Othering also estranges recruits from the people they are supposed to hate, which makes it hard to stop hating them.

So there’s this concept that comes up a lot in my research called Contact Hypothesis. Contact Hypothesis argues that, the more contact you have with a different walk of life, the easier it is to tolerate it. It’s like exposure therapy. We talk about how big cities and college campuses tend to be liberal strongholds; the Right likes to claim this is because of professors and politicians poisoning your mind, but it’s really just because they’re diverse. When you share space with a lot of different kinds of people, a degree of liberalism becomes necessary just to get by. And we see that belief systems which rely on a strict orthodoxy get really cagey about members having contact with outsiders. We see this in all the groups we’re discussing today - extremists, cultists, totalitarians - but also religious fundamentalists; Mormons only wanna send their kids to Brigham Young. They are belief systems that can only be reliably maintained so long as no one gets exposed to other people with other beliefs.

So that’s some of what I took from Kimmel. Next I read Stein talking, primarily, about cults.

Stein’s window into all of this is applying the theory of Attachment Styles to what researchers calls totalism, which is any structure that subsumes a person’s entire life the way cults and totalitarian governments do. Attachment is a concept you may be familiar with if have, or have ever dated, a therapist. (I’ve done both.)

So, for a quick primer:

Imagine you’re walking in the park with a three-year-old. And the three-year-old sees a dog, and ask, “Can I pet the dog?” And you say yes, and the kid steps away from your side and reaches out. And the dog gets excited, and jumps up, and the kid gets scared and runs back to you. So you hold the kid and go, “Oh, no no no, don’t worry! They’re not gonna hurt you! They were just happy to see you!” And you take a few moments to calm the kid down, and then you ask, “Do you still want to pet the dog?” And the kid says “yes,” so they step away from you again and reach out. The dog jumps up again, but this time the kid doesn’t run away, and they pet the dog, and you, the kid, and the dog are all happy. Hooray!

This is a fundamental piece of a child’s emotional development. They take a risk, have a negative experience, and retreat to a point of comfort. Then, having received that comfort, feel bolstered enough to take a slightly greater risk. A healthy childhood is steadily venturing further and further from that point of comfort, and taking on greater risks, secure in the knowledge that safety is there when they need it. And, as an adult, they will form many interdependent points of comfort rather than relying on only one or two.

If all goes according to plan, that is Secure Attachment. But: sometimes things go wrong when the kid seeks comfort and doesn’t get enough. This may be because the adult is withholding or the kid doesn’t know how to express their needs or they’re just particularly fearful. But the kid may start seeking comfort more than seems reasonable, and be particularly averse to risk, and over-focus on the people who give them comfort, because they’re operating at a deficit. We call that Anxious Attachment. Alternately, the kid may give up on receiving comfort altogether, even though they still need it, and just go it alone, developing a distrust of other people and a fear of being vulnerable. We call that Avoidant Attachment.

Now, these styles are all formed in early childhood, but Stein focuses on a fourth kind of Attachment, one that can be formed at any age regardless of the Attachment Style you came in with. It’s what happens when the negative experience and the comfort come from the same place. We see it in children and adults who are mistreated by the people they trust. It’s called Disorganized Attachment.

According to Stein, cults foster Disorganized Attachment by being intensely unpredictable. In a cult, you may be praised for your commitment on Monday and have your commitment questioned on Tuesday, with no change in behavior. You may be assigned a romantic partner, who may, at any point, be taken away, assigned to someone else. Your children may be taken from you to be raised by a different family. You may be told the cult leader wants to sleep with you, which may make you incredibly happy or be terrifying, but you won’t be given a choice. And the rules you are expected to follow will be rewritten without warning.

This creates a kind of emotional chaos, where you can’t predict when you will be given good feelings and when you will be given bad ones. But you’re so enmeshed in the community you have noplace else to go for good feelings; hurting you just draws you in deeper, because they are also where you seek comfort. And your pain is always your fault: you wouldn’t feel so shitty if you were more committed. Trying to make sense of this causes so much confusion and anguish that you eventually just stop thinking for yourself. These are the rules now? OK. He’s not my brother anymore? OK. This is my life now? OK.

Hardly anyone would seek out such a dynamic, which is why cults present as religions, political activists, and therapy groups; things people in questioning phases of their lives are liable to seek out, and then they fall down the rabbit hole before they know what’s happening. The cult slowly consumes more and more of a recruit’s life, and tightly controls access to relationships outside the cult, because the biggest threat to a Disorganized Attachment relationship is having separate, Securely Attached points of comfort.

And at this point I said, “Hold up. You’re telling me cults recruit by offering people community and purpose in times of need, become the focal point of their entire lives, estrange them from all outside perspectives, and then cause emotional distress that paradoxically makes them more committed because they have nowhere else to go for support?”

Isn’t that exactly how Kimmel described joining a hate group?

Now, these are commonalities, not a one-to-one comparison. A cult is far more organized and rigidly controlled than a hate group. But Stein points out that this dynamic of isolation, engulfment, and pain is the same dynamic as an abusive relationship. The difference is just scale. A cult is functionally a single person having a very complex domestic abuse situation with a whole lot of people, #badpolyamory.

So if we posit a spectrum with domestic abuse on one end and cults and totalitarianism on the other, I started wondering, could we put extremist groups, like ISIS and Aryan Nations, around… here?

And, if so, where would we put the Alt-Right?

Now, I have to tread carefully here. There are reasons this talk is called “How the Alt-Right is Like an Abusive Relationship” and not “How the Alt-Right is Like a Cult,” because the moment you say the second thing, a lot of people stop listening to you. Our conception of cults and totalitarianism is way more controlled and structured than a pack of loud, racist assholes on the internet. But we’re not talking about organizational structure, we’re talking about a relationship, an emotional dynamic Stein calls “anxious dependency,” which fosters an irrational loyalty to people who are bad for you and gets you to adopt an ideology you would have previously rejected. (I would also love to go on a rant puncturing the idea that cultists and fascists are organized, pointing out this notion is propaganda and their systems are notoriously corrupt and mismanaged, but we don’t have time; ask me about it in the Q&A if you want me to go off.)

So I started looking through what I knew, and what I could find, about the Alt-Right to see if I could spot this same pattern of isolation, engulfment, and pain online funneling people towards the Alt-Right. And I did not come up short.

Isolation? Well, the Alt-Right traffics in all the same dehumanizing narratives about their enemies as Kimmel’s hate groups - like, the worst things you can imagine a human being saying about a group of people are said every day in these forums. They often berate and harass each other for any perceived sympathy towards The Other Side. They also regularly harass people from The Other Side off of platforms, and falsely report their tweets, posts, and videos as terrorism to get them taken down. (This has happened to me, incidentally.) I found figureheads adored by the Alt-Right who expressly tell people to cut ties with liberal family members.

We talked before about Contact Hypothesis? There’s also this idea called Parasocial Contact Hypothesis. A parasocial relationship is a strong emotional connection that only goes one way, like if you really love my videos and have started thinking of me almost as a friend even though I don’t know you exist? Yeah. Parasocial relationship. They’ve been in The Discourse lately, largely thanks to my friend Shannon Strucci making a really great video about them (check it out, I make a cameo, but… clear your schedule). Parasocial Contact Hypothesis is this phenomenon where, if people form parasocial feelings for public figures or even fictional characters, and those people happen to be Black, white audience members become less racist similar to how they would if they had Black friends. Your logical brain knows that these are strangers, but your lizard brain doesn’t know the difference between empathy for a queer friend and empathy for a queer character in a video game. So of course the Alt-Right makes a big stink about queer characters in video games, and leads boycotts against “forced diversity,” because diverse media is bad for recruitment.

Engulfment? Well, I learned way too much about how the Alt-Right will overtake your entire internet life. There was a paper made the rounds last year by Rebecca Lewis charting the interconnectedness of conservative YouTube. (Reactionaries really hated this paper because it said things they didn’t like.) Lewis argues that, once you enter what she calls the Alternative Influence Network, it tends to keep you inside it. Start with some YouTuber conservatives like but who’s branded as a moderate, or even a “classic liberal.” Take someone like Dave Rubin; call Dave Rubin Alt-Right, people yell at you, I speak from experience. Well, Dave Rubin’s had Jordan Peterson on his show, so, if you watch Rubin, Peterson ends up in your recommendations. Peterson has been on the Joe Rogan show, so, you watch Peterson, Rogan ends up in your recommendations. And Rogan has interviewed Gavin McInnes, so you watch Rogan and McInnes ends up in your recommendations.

Gavin McInnes is the head of the Proud Boys, a self-described “western chauvinist” organization that’s mostly known for beating up liberals and leftists. They have ties to neo-fascist groups like Identity Evropa and neo-fascist militias like the Oath Keepers, they run security for white nationalists, and their lawyer just went on record that he identifies as a fascist. And, if you’re one of these kids who has YouTube in the background with autoplay on, and you’re watching Dave Rubin? You might be as few as 3 videos away from watching Gavin McInnes.

There’s a lot of talk these days about algorithms funneling people towards the Right, and that’s not wrong, but it’s an oversimplification. The real problem is that the Right knows how to hijack an algorithm.

I also learned about the Curation/Search Radicalization Spiral from a piece by Mike Caulfield. Caulfiend uses the horrific example of Dylann Roof. You remember him? He shot up a church in a Black neighborhood a few years ago. Roof says he was radicalized when he googled “Black on white crime” and saw the results. Now, if you search the phrase “crime statistics by demographic,” you will find fairly nonpartisan results that show most crimes are committed against members of the perpetrator’s own race, and Black people commit crimes against white people at about the same rate as any other two demographics. But that specific phrase, “Black on white crime,” is used almost exclusively by white racists, and so Roof’s first hit wasn’t a database of crime statistics, it was the Council of Conservative Citizens. Now, the CCC is an outgrowth of the White Citizens Councils of the 50’s and 60’s which rebranded in ‘85. They publish bogus statistics that paint Black people as uniquely violent. And they introduce a number of other politically-loaded phrases - like, say, “Muslim fertility rates” - that nonpartisan sites don’t use, and so, if Roof googles them as well, he gets similarly weighted results.

I have tons more examples of this stuff. I literally don’t have time to show it all. Like, have you heard of Google bombing? That’s a thing I didn’t know existed. The point is, the same way search engines tailor your results to what they think you want, once you scratch the surface of the Alt-Right they are highly adept at making it so, whenever you go online, their version of reality is all you know and all you see.

Finally, pain. This was the difficult one. Can you create a Disorganized Attachment relationship over the internet with a largely faceless and decentralized movement? I pitched the idea to one the researchers I spoke to, and he said, “That sounds very plausible, and nearly impossible to research.” See, cults and hate groups? They don’t wanna talk to researchers anymore than the Alt-Right wants to talk to me. Stein and Kimmel get their data by speaking to formers, people who’ve exited these movements and are all too happy to share how horrible they were. But the Alt-Right is still very young, and there just aren’t that many formers yet.

I found some testimonials, and they mostly back up my hypothesis, but there’s not enough that I could call them statistically significant. So I had to look where the data was.

My fellow YouTuber ContraPoints made a video last year - in my opinion, her best one - about incels (that’s “involuntary celibate,” men who can’t get laid). Incel forums tend to be deeply misogynistic and antifeminist, and have a high overlap with the Alt-Right. If you remember Elliot Rodger, he was an incel. Contra’s observation was that these forums were incredibly fatalistic: you are too ugly and women too shallow for you to ever have sex, so you should give up. She described a certain catharsis, like picking a really painful scab, in hearing other people voice your worst fears. But there was no uplift; these communities seemed to have a zero-tolerance policy for optimism. She likened it so some deeply unhealthy trans forums she used to visit, where people wallowed in their own dysphoria.

And I remembered the forums I researched five years ago in preparation for my video on GamerGate. (If you don’t know what GamerGate was, I will not rob you of your precious innocence. But, in a lot of ways, GamerGate was the trial run for what the Alt-Right has become.) These forums were full of angry guys surrounding themselves with people saying, “You’re right to be angry.” And, yeah, if everywhere else you go treats your anger as invalid, that scratches an itch. But I never saw any of them calm down. They came in angry and they came out angrier. And most didn’t have anywhere else to vent, so they all came back.

I found a paper on Alt-Right forums that described a similar type of nihilism, and another on 8chan. What humor was on these sites was always shocking, furiously punching down, and deeply self-referential, but it didn’t seem like anyone was expected to laugh anymore, just, you know, catch the reference. I found one testimonial saying that having healthy relationships in these spaces is functionally impossible, and the one former I talked to said, yeah, when the Alt-Right isn’t winning everyone’s miserable.

So I think it might fit. The place they go for relief also makes them unhappy, so they come back to get relief again, and it just repeats. Same reason people stay with abusers. I wanna look into this further, so, I’ll just say this part to the camera: if there are any researchers watching who wanna study this, get at me.

Finally, I read Alt-America by David Neiwert, a supremely useful book that I highly recommend if you wanna know how the Alt-Right is the natural outgrowth of the militia and Patriot movements of the 90’s and early 2000’s, not to mention the Tea Party. Neiwert also does an excellent job illustrating how conspiracism serves to fill in the gap between the complexity of the modern world and the simplistic, might-makes-right worldview of fascism.

Neiwert also provides an interesting piece of the puzzle, suggesting what people are actually looking for when they get recruited. He references work done by John Bargh and Katelyn McKenna on Identity Demarginalization. Bargh and McKenna looked at the internet habits of people whose identities are both devalued in our society and invisible. By invisible, what I mean is, ok, if you’re a person of color, our society devalues your identity, but you can look around a room and, within a certain margin of error, see who else is POC, and form community with them if you wish. But, if you’re queer, you can’t see who else in a room is queer unless one of you runs up a flag. And revealing yourself always means taking on a certain amount of risk that you’ve misread the signals, that the person you reveal yourself to is not only not queer, but a homophobe.

According to Bargh and McKenna, people in this situation are much more likely to seek online spaces that self-select for that identity. A fan forum for RuPaul’s Drag Race is maybe a safer place to come out and find community. And people tend to get very emotionally tied to these online spaces where they can be themselves.

Neiwert points out that the same phenomenon happens among privileged people who have identities that are devalued even as they’re not actually oppressed. Say, nerds, or conservatives in liberal towns, or men who don’t fit traditional notions of masculinity. They are also likely to deeply invest themselves in online spaces made for them. And if the Far Right can build such a community, or get a foothold in one that already exists, it is very easy to channel that sense of marginalization into Durden Syndrome. I connected this with Rebecca Lewis’ observation that the Alternative Influence Network tends to present itself as nerd-focused life advice first and politics second, and the long history of reactionaries recruiting from fandoms.

So I can see all the pieces of the abuse dynamic being recreated here: offer you something you need, estrange you from other perspectives and healthy relationships, overtake your life, and provoke emotional distress that makes you seek comfort only your abuser is offering. And I found a lot more parallels than what I’m sharing right now, I only have half an hour! But the thing that’s missing that’s usually central to such a system is, an abusive relationship orbits around the abuser, a cult around the cult leader, a totalitarian government around a dictator. They are built to serve the whims of an individual. But I look at the ad hoc nature of the Alt-Right and I have to ask: who is the architect?

I can see a lot of people profiting off of this structure; our current President rode it to great success, but he didn’t build it. It predates him. It’s more like Kimmel’s hate groups, which don’t promote an individual so much as a class of individuals, but, even then, their structure is much more deliberate, designed, where the Alt-Right seems almost improvised.

Well… one observation I took from Stein is that cult recruiters often rely on two different kinds of propaganda: the winding diatribe and the thought-terminating cliche. The diatribe is when someone talks at length, sounds smart, and seems to know what they’re talking about but isn’t actually making sense, and the thought-terminating cliche comes from Robert Jay Lifton’s studies into brainwashing. So, I went vegetarian in middle school, and, when I would tell other kids I was vegetarian, some would get kind of defensive and say things like, “humans aren’t meant to be vegetarian, it’s the food chain.” Now, saying “it’s the food chain” isn’t meant to be a good argument, it’s meant to communicate “I have said something so axiomatically true that the argument need not continue.” That’s a thought-terminating cliche; something that may not be true, but feels true and gives you permission to think about something else.

Both these techniques rely on what’s called Peripheral-Route Processing. So, I’m up here talking about politics, and, Solidarity Lowell, you are a group of politically-engaged people, so you probably have enough context to know whether I’m talking out of my ass. That’s Direct-Route Processing, where you judge the contents of my argument. But if I were up here talking about string theory, you might not know whether I was talking out of my ass because there’s only so many people on Earth who understand string theory. So then you might look at secondary characteristics of my argument: the fact that I’ve been invited to speak on string theory implies I know what I’m talking about; maybe I put up a lot of equations and drop the names of mathematicians and say they agree with me; maybe I just sound really authoritative. All that’s Peripheral-Route Processing: judging the quality of my argument by how it’s delivered.

Every act of communication involves both, but if you’re trying to sell people on something that’s fundamentally irrational, you’re going to rely heavily on Peripheral-Route tactics, which is what the winding diatribe and the thought-terminating cliche are.

I noted that these two methods mapped pretty cleanly onto the rhetorical stylings of Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro. But here’s the question: cults use these techniques to recruit people. But can I say with any confidence that Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro are trying to recruit people into the Alt-Right?

The thing is, “Alt-Right” isn’t a term like “klansman.” It’s more akin to a term like “modernism.” It’s a label applied to a trend. In the same way we debate the line between modernism and postmodernism, we debate the line between Right and Alt-Right. People don’t sign up to be in the Alt-Right, you are Alt-Right if you say you’re Alt-Right. But the nature of the Alt-Right is that 90% of them would never admit to it.

So are Peterson and Shapiro intentionally recruiting for the Alt-Right? Are they grifters merely profiting off of the Alt-Right? Are they even aware they’re recruiting for the Alt-Right? Part of my work has been accepting that you can’t know for sure. It would be naive to say they’re unaware; when they give speeches they get Nazis in their Q&A sections, and they know that. But how aware are they? I suspect Shapiro moreso than Peterson, but that’s just my gut talking and I can’t prove it. Like 90% of the Alt-Right, it’s debatable.

I don’t know if they’re trying to be part of this system, I just know they’re not trying not to be.

A final academic term before we say goodnight that’s been making the rounds among lefty YouTubers is “Stochastic Terrorism.” There’s a really great video about this by the channel NonCompete called The PewDiePipeline. Stochastic Terrorism is the myriad ways you can increase the likelihood that someone will commit violence without actually telling them to. You simply create an environment in which lone wolf violence becomes more acceptable and appealing. It mirrors the structure of terrorism without the control or culpability.

And I hear about this, and I look at this recruitment structure I see approximated in the Alt-Right, and I remember something I learned much earlier in my research, from Bob Altemeyer in his book The Authoritarians. Altemeyer has been studying authoritarianism for decades, he has a wealth of data, and one thing he observes is that authoritarianism is the few exerting power over the many, which means there are two types of authoritarians: the ones who lead and the ones who follow. Turns out those are completely different personality profiles. Followers don’t want to be in charge, they want someone to tell them what to do, to say “you’re the good guys,” and put them in charge of punishing the bad guys. They don’t even care who the bad guys are; part of the appeal is that someone else makes that judgment for them.

So if you can encourage a degree of authoritarian sentiment in people, get them wanting nothing more than to be ensconced in a totalist system that will take their agency away from them, putting them in the orbit of an authoritarian leader, but no leader presents themself… can you just kind of… appoint one?

Like, if you don’t have a leader, can you just find yourself an authoritarian and treat him like one? And, if he doesn’t give you enough directives, can you just make some up? And, if you don’t have recruiters, can you find a conservative who speaks in thought-terminating cliches just because he thinks they win arguments; find a conservative who speaks in meaningless diatribes because he thinks he’s making sense; and then maneuver those speeches and videos in front of people you want to recruit? If you’re sick of waiting for Moses to come down the mountain with the Word of God, can you just build your own god from whatever’s handy?

Every piece of this structure, you can find people, algorithms, and arguments that, put in sequence, can generate Disorganized Attachment whether they’re trying to or not, which makes every part plausibly deniable. Debatable. You just need to make it profitable enough for the ones involved that they don’t fix it. This is a system created collaboratively, on the fly, with the help of a lot of people from hate movements past, mostly by throwing a ton of shit at the wall and seeing what sticks. The Alt-Right is a rapidly-mutating virus and the web is the perfect incubator; it very quickly finds a structure that works, and it’s a structure we’ve seen before, just a little weirder this time.

I’ve started calling this Stochastic Totalism.

Now, again, I’m not a professional researcher; I do my homework but I don’t have the background. I have an art degree. This isn’t something I can prove so much as a way I’ve come to look at the Alt-Right that makes sense to me and helps me understand them. And I got a lot of comments on my last video from people who used to be Alt-Right that echoed my assumptions. But don’t take it as gospel.

Mostly I wanted to share this because, if it can help you make sense of what we’re dealing with, I think it’s worth putting out there.

Thank you.

[radramblog]

Letting Go- Fallout: New Vegas DLC analysis Pt. 1

I’m no youtube video essayist, and I’m sure one of those has done a better job of this than I will, but I’m very passionate about this game, and it’s been in my head a lot recently, so I’m hankering to write about it.

The themes of the 4 Expansions to Fallout: New Vegas, Dead Money, Honest Hearts, Old World Blues, and Lonesome Road, relate to one core theme: letting go, and beginning again. This resonates through both the individual plots of each one as well as the overarching story ending with the final confrontation of Lonesome Road. While each is separate, with its own locations, conflicts, and scenarios, this theme is resonant in each, and reflects the main story’s core conflict, being the greed of various factions trying to control the Mojave.

Spoilers inside.

Dead Money

Dead Money, the first DLC, involves the Courier being ambushed and trapped inside the pre-war casino, the Sierra Madre, by Elijah, the former Elder of the Mojave’s Brotherhood of Steel. Time and technology have turned the Madre into a deathtrap, with mutants and poisonous gas around every corner, limited resources, and the bomb collar helpfully strapped to the Courier’s neck by Elijah.

The theme of letting go is very unsubtle in Dead Money. The ending slideshow literally has it narrated by each of the characters simultaneously. And while it is also present in the stories of Dog/God and Christine, it’s Dean and Elijah who are both holding on to greed, to revenge, and to ego. Elijah is obsessed with the technology of the old world, having gotten countless Brotherhood members killed at the battle of HELIOS One, and desperately wants to master the technologies that make the Madre so dangerous to take revenge on the wasteland that he feels scorned him. This obsession leads him to kidnap possibly dozens of people, putting bombs around their necks to ensure compliance, forcing them to try and open the Casino so he can claim the prize- unsuccessfully, until the Courier becomes his latest victim. And while at the climax of the story it is easier to kill him, it is just as possible to trap him inside the vault, letting that greed directly lead to his own downfall. Elijah couldn’t let go of his desperate and dangerous ambitions, and either way he meets his end as a result.

The vault of the Sierra Madre, however, was obviously not designed as a trap for someone born over a hundred years after its creation. Dean Domino was a pre-war singer, and a romantic rival/personal enemy to Sinclair, the casino’s creator. The trap of the vault was meant for him- Sinclair knew of his plan to break in, leaving a document on the vault’s computer that Dean’s curiosity wouldn’t let him ignore, that when opened would permanently lock with Dean inside. This heist, of course, was interrupted by the end of the world. After the bombs fell, he was ghoulified, and while Sinclair and their shared beau were safe in the Madre, it was but a gilded cage that both of them eventually succumbed to. Dean, however, couldn’t let go of them- he’s been planning to rob the Madre for 200 years, bomb collar or not, and still wants petty revenge on Sinclair despite him being long-dead. Ego is Dean’s main downfall- to the point where it’s impossible to talk him down from a fight if you have ever slighted him in dialogue (since one such slight is a skill check, most people end up doing so)- and as such like Elijah his inability to let go leads directly to his death. Unlike Elijah, however, it’s possible for him to survive, at which point he does begin again- finally leaving the Madre behind for the Mojave. The good endings for all 3 companions involve them effectively resetting their lives, beginning again, with Christine resolving to watch over the Madre’s surrounds to prevent its dangers from escaping, and Dog/God quite literally becoming a new person.

The player is also forced to let the treasure of the Sierra Madre behind. Once you enter the vault, you’ll find stacks of gold bars- enough to bankrupt the entire economy of the main game. They are also incredibly heavy, to the point of overencumbering any character with only a few, even if you strip off all your equipment, and without the ability to run surviving the destruction of the casino is impossible. While it is technically possible to swipe the full load (and it’s easy enough to get away with one or two bars), that’s not the point- greed, and the Madre, are a trap, and like Dean and Elijah before you too must learn to let go of it.

 Honest Hearts

A lot of people cite Honest Hearts as their least favourite of the DLCs, and while I tend to agree, that by no means makes it bad. On the contrary, Zion is a gorgeous location, and exploring it is an absolute blast. However, it also relates the least, arguably, to the themes I’ve been discussing.

Honest Hearts is a story about three tribes- the Dead Horses, lead by Joshua Graham, the Sorrows, led by Daniel, and the White Legs, led by Salt-upon-Wounds. Both Joshua and Daniel are New Canaanites, Mormons living among the tribes after their home was destroyed by the White Legs. The main thematic ties center around the character of Joshua, a character who, while already having begun again, still has yet to let go. Joshua was the first Legate for Caesar’s Legion, the head of its army and a death-cheating force of nature, until his lack of strategic talent lead to his failure at the first battle of Hoover Dam. For this was made an example, lit aflame and tossed into the Grand Canyon, but survived both in man and as the myth of the Burned Man. From there he returned to Zion, to become the Dead Horse tribes de facto leader, restarting his life but being threatened by old mistakes.

The only real choice you get in Honest Hearts’s story is how to handle the White Legs situation- siding with Joshua and wiping them out, or with Daniel and evacuating both the Dead Horses and the Sorrows. In essence, you choose whether Joshua lets go of revenge against the White Legs for the destruction of New Canaan, or whether he exacts said vengeance with you in tow (not that he needs the help). His arc is left frustratingly unresolved in the former case, but in the latter he is given one final decision point- to execute the defeated Salt-Upon-Wounds or not- to symbolically let go of his past mistakes, or to pursue the vengeance he’s been carrying for years. Ultimately not killing SUW is the only choice that leads to him truly growing as a person, realising his own faults and how he’d been using his faith to indulge his own anger at those who have wronged him.

Thematically, however, that’s about it, and Honest Hearts is otherwise largely divorced from the rest of the main story, the DLCs, and the themes of such. It’s still a good time, and Joshua Graham is ridiculously cool, but it’s analytical relevance is nothing compared to Dead Money or Lonesome Road.

[aion-rsa]

Shang-Chi Trailer Teases New Era for MCU Visuals

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

It’s not what you’re used to seeing in a Marvel Studios release: bright neon light casting Simu Liu and his on screen opponent in neon silhouette; a dazzling array of forested trees acting as both venue and enraptured audience for a fight scene in the woods; just even an occasional emphasis on shadows, period. Yet all these things and more are visible in the new Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings trailer.

Could this be a signal that the Phase 4 era of the MCU will be a more visually dynamic one? We can hope.

The new film, which opens in September as Marvel’s first post-Black Widow release—and the first film made by Disney set after the events of 2019’s gargantuan Avengers: Endgame—is a bit of a fresh start for Marvel. In addition to not being a sequel or a prequel to an already established character, it is the first MCU film starring an actor of Asian descent (not to mention a wholly more diverse cast), as well as an attempt to right the perceived wrongs of dismissing the “Ten Rings” organization as a punchline in Iron Man 3.

However, it might also be a chance to further diversify Marvel’s visual style which, by and large, has been blandly utilitarian for about a decade. It didn’t begin this way. Jon Favreau’s first two Iron Man films were both shot on 35mm celluloid and have a playfully colorful dynamism to them. Kenneth Branagh’s first Thor, for whatever other flaws, also had a relatively stylish cinematography. Yet beginning with Marvel’s transition to digital cinematography on Captain America: The First Avenger and especially The Avengers, a rather uninspired, overly well-lit visual presentation became the unofficial Marvel house style.

Video essayist Patrick H. Willems accurately described how many of the Marvel movies of the mid-2010s, with flat lighting and the type of visual uniformity found on television, often resembled a “parking lot.”

There have been outliers, of course. The Guardians of the Galaxy films and Thor: Ragnarok have particularly been exceptions, but arguably the kind that prove the rule. Nevertheless, most of the visual awe in MCU movies tends to come from what’s designed in a computer instead of what’s captured by an actual physical camera. Shang-Chi suggests that could change.

With the aforementioned action shots glimpsed in the trailer, some imagery in the film seems inspired by a fight scene in Sam Mendes’ Skyfall, while other shots clearly evoke Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (and hello there, Michelle Yeoh!), director Destin Daniel Cretton appears to be wearing his influences on his sleeves. Formerly an indie filmmaker behind critical darlings like Short Term 12 and Just Mercy, as well as the first Asian American MCU director, Cretton is open about wanting to shake up the visual look of Marvel movies.

In 2019 he even explained to Collider why he wanted Bill Pope, the cinematographer of The Matrix, to lens Shang-Chi.

“He has a really beautiful style, that’s both naturalistic and grounded, but also heightened, in the best way,” Cretton said. “And anybody who can shoot The Matrix is probably gonna do great with this one… I think particularly for our first Asian/Asian American step into the MCU, that tone feels right.”

Indeed, Pope did lens all three of the Wachowski sisters’ original Matrix trilogy. Additionally, he has experience of overseeing the photography on some of the most stylish genre films in the last decade, including every Edgar Wright film since Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, including 2017’s Baby Driver. And in the realm of superheroes, Pope was the DP on Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 2 and Spider-Man 3, with the former still widely recognized as one of the best (and best looking) superhero films ever produced.

Shang-Chi will similarly be Pope’s first movie in the MCU. And if the trailer is anything to go by, he’ll be bringing some very welcome style to the proceedings. Perhaps things really will look quite different in Phase 4?

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

The post Shang-Chi Trailer Teases New Era for MCU Visuals appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3sB0b6a

[creativinn]

'Time for Outrage!': an art exhibition in challenging times | DW | 29.10.2020

Anger and hatred are intense human feelings, yet these negative emotions are clearly shaping our current social interactions to an ever greater extent  — conspiracy theories, extremist terrorism and violent hate speech have become commonplace.

The exhibition "Time for Outrage! Art in Times of Social Anger" at the Kunstpalast museum in Düsseldorf is a response to the "social upheavals of our time," said Kunstpalast director Felix Krämer.

The showcased works by 35 clearly political artists and art activists illustrate and reflect on notions of anger in our challenging times.

The exhibits reflect art as a political space, said curator Linda Peitz, adding that the artists urge "solidarity, empathy and humanism, who point out, analyze or ironically break down the injustices in our society."

The inscription over the artist's photo is a quote from graffiti

'Outrage does not equal hatred'

This also reveals an implicit but important distinction between hate and anger on the one hand, and outrage and rage on the other. While anger is undirected, indignation and rage refer to concrete events. The suspense that marks the exhibition is founded on this semantic difference.

Particularly impressive: a work by the Bosnian artist Sejla Kameric, originally conceived as a poster but wallpapered on a 12-meter high wall in Düsseldorf. It shows the artist and the words of a Dutch NATO soldier, who in 1994 or 1995 wrote on a barracks wall in the village of Potocari near Srebrenica: "No teeth? A moustache? Smells like shit? Bosnian girl!"

Kameric reminds us of the war in former Yugoslavia and the genocide of thousands of Bosnians in Srebrenica but she also links the soldier's cruel graffito with her portrait, which makes it more personal. In the photo she looks straight at the visitors, forcing them to evaluate the work.

Observers can't avoid taking a stance

Many of the exhibits, for the most part photographs, video installations and films, work along those lines. What initially comes across as more of a documentary form helps juxtapose the two defining levels of the exhibition — hate and, as a result, outrage. The audience must draw its own conclusions from these juxtapositions.

At times, it is perspective that forces the viewer to take on an active role, for instance in Signe Pierce and Alli Coates' experimental setups.

What is private, what is political?

Yoshinori Niwa, a conceptual artist from Japan, set up a container in front of the musem where people can get rid of Nazi memorabilia. Ads in the local newspaper urged citizens to participate in the project named "Withdrawing Hitler from a private space" and to drop off any such artifacts so they can be destroyed at the end of the exhibition.

Feminist artist Judith Bernstein evokes 'Trump horror'

A video by French artist Kader Attia also focuses on how private becomes political if you have the 'wrong' origin. In "The Body's Legacies Pt. 2: The Post-Colonial Body," he interviews descendants of colonized people and slaves, showing how colonial violence and racism still influence the perception of the body and the behavior of people in public space today.

Reclaim outrage 

It is no coincidence that the title of the exhibition refers to the title of a well-known essay published in 2010 by the late Stephane Hessel, a French essayist and political activist who was a resistance fighter in the Nazi era. The exhibition echoes issues that were pressing even then, including the meaning of human rights, how we treat refugees and social inequality.

The show that was a year and a half in the making is surprisingly topical, and the coronavirus pandemic has even worsened many of the global injustices addressed. In recent months in particular, conspiracy theorists have dangerously often misappropriated his words. To a degree, the exhibition corrects the discourse by looking at overarching issues that have long been toxic, while also recapturing Hessel's basic ideas behind his call for outrage.

This article has been adapted from German by Dagmar Breitenbach

This content was originally published here.

[mrmichaelchadler]

Columbus

This review was originally published on August 4, 2017 and is being republished for Women Writers Week.

The buildings rise up out of the grass and trees like relics of a mysterious more sophisticated civilization. They are abstract, startling, sometimes anti-gravitational. They are not monuments. They were built for utilitarian purposes: banks, offices, a church, a library, a hospital. These geometric Modernist buildings pepper the landscape of the "Midwest Mecca of Architecture," Columbus, Indiana, and were designed by some of the most innovative architects of the 20th century: it's no wonder people travel there from all over to take architecture tours. Columbus' architecture is the canvas for "Columbus," the stunning directorial debut of Kogonada (mainly known up until now as a video essayist, whose Vimeo page is a great archive of visual analysis). What Kogonada has done with "Columbus" (along with cinematographer Elisha Christian) is to blend the background into the foreground and vice versa, so that you see things through the eyes of the two architecture-obsessed main characters. Watching the film is almost like feeling the muscles in your eyes shift, as you look up from reading a book to stare out at the ocean. From the very first shot, it's clear that the buildings will be essential. They are a part of the lives unfolding in their shadows. Sometimes it almost seems like they are listening. 

There is a story in "Columbus." What is remarkable is how intense it is, given the stillness and quiet of Kogonada's style, and the focus with which he films the buildings. 

A Korean-born man named Jin (John Cho) travels to Columbus to care for his father, who is in the hospital following a catastrophic collapse. Accompanying him is an old friend (and possibly onetime lover), who was also his father's star pupil, played by Parker Posey. Jin has a distant relationship with his father. He can't connect with the worry and sadness his friend is feeling. On a separate track initially, we meet Casey (Haley Lu Richardson), working as a page at the Cleo Rogers Memorial Library (one of the most important interiors in the film). Casey has graduated from high school but has put off going to college perhaps indefinitely because her mother is a former meth addict. ("Meth is really big here," says Casey. "Meth and Modernism.") She fears what will happen to her mother without her. Casey and a coworker (Rory Culkin) have interesting discussions, sitting amidst the towering stacks, their conversations a blend of tentative flirting, kindness, and gentle debate. One day, Jin bums a cigarette from Casey. They strike up a conversation. 

Over the course of "Columbus," Casey, obsessed with architecture, takes Jin around, showing him her favorite buildings (she has a list). Jin is significantly older than Casey, but he treats her as a peer. There is instantly an intimacy between them, perhaps because both are so exhausted by their life circumstances. Their dynamic is fascinating. There's an irritable quality to some of it, as though neither one of them wants to let the other "get away with" just skating off the surface of things. When Casey rattles off facts about the famous glass bank designed by Eero Saarinen, Jin gets bored. He pushes her to go deeper: what does the building make you feel? There were only a couple of moments when the script was a little on the nose. But even in those moments the characters were wandering through such interesting spaces that there was always plenty to look at. 

Kogonada places their human figures against striking man-made backdrops with extreme care. He chooses his angles meticulously. There isn't an uninteresting shot in the whole thing. Shots repeat. Alleyways, sculptures, doorways, glass walls, the clocktower with the asymmetrical clockface, the church with the asymmetrical cross ... we go back to them again and again, Kogonada giving us time to contemplate them, to sink into them. There's so much sadness in the film, it seeps into the air. Kogonada allows space for it, interspersing the conversations between Jin and Casey, or Casey and her mother, with long still shots of the library's striking ceiling, of the glass bank gleaming at night, the glass walkway hovering over a river, of the two brick monoliths floating in the air, almost, but not quite, touching. It's a profound approach. The depth of emotion the film stirred up surprised me. I got so involved in these two people's lives. I cared about them. I liked eavesdropping on their conversations.

When I first moved to New York, every time I caught a glimpse of the Chrysler Building's whimsical jewel-like crown, my breath would catch in my throat. Eventually, over time, I got used to it as part of my everyday world. But there are moments, usually at dusk, when suddenly it's like I see it for the first time, and I stare upward, taking a moment to appreciate that architect William Van Alen thought that building up, that he saw something that beautiful in his mind, and that he knew what it would add to the skyline: something so tall, and yet also so delicate. I try to remind myself: Make sure to look at the Chrysler Building on occasion. Make sure to appreciate it. "Columbus" is a movie about the experience of looking, the interior space that opens up when you devote yourself to looking at something, receptive to the messages it might have for you. Movies (the best ones anyway) are the same way. Looking at something in a concentrated way requires a mind-shift. Sometimes it takes time for the work to even reach you, since there's so much mental ballast in the way. The best directors point to things, saying, in essence: "Look." I haven't been able to get "Columbus" out of my mind.

from All Content https://ift.tt/2jbbioi

[reg-reviews]

Train to Busan - Remembering the Wheel

Train to Busan was my favourite film of last year. Not just my favourite Korean film; not just my favourite genre film - it was without any doubt in my mind my favourite film of 2016. Before I bought my ticket I hadn't heard any hype, hadn't seen the trailer, and literally all I knew about it going in was that it was a Korean zombie movie (which should be enough in anyone's book). So it's fair to say I wasn't expecting to have my mind blown as much as it was when I sat in my seat. But blown my mind was, to the point where I seriously considered standing in my seat and applauding when the credits finally rolled. No, seriously. 

Now, naturally I was in a serious rush after that first viewing. Looking back now, it's possible that while a significant part of that was the quality of the film, some may have been the excitement of discovering something new that I hadn't heard anyone else talking about – not my friends nor any film buffs or reviewers I followed. There's something to be said about being The First in your circle to discover something amazing, as well as the hope that you'll inspire others to seek it out and the satisfaction in hearing their approval. But there's also something to be said about staying power, and when I started to come down off the high I began to wonder if I should dare a second viewing. Would it be a film that reinforces my love on a second viewing, like The Spectacular Now, or would the roller coaster be to some degree less exciting once I knew all of its twists and turns ala Snowpiercer?

As you may have guessed, I was pleased beyond measure to find it to be the former. If I was surprised Train to Busan made me cry the first time I watched it, I was astounded to find myself crying again for round two. And I guess that’s when I began to wonder. I've seen a lot of the tropes in many films before, but why had they worked so well in this film, yet fell flat in so many others attempting the same? Why could I find myself remembering every character and dramatic moment in, of all things, a zombie movie? Over the many long, wearisome months between the film's cinematic run and its (thank God) eventual Blu-ray release, I found myself mulling over it in my mind, and now after watching it again, I feel compelled to get some kind of attempt at an analysis out of my system.

I should admit from the get go that I did not study film at University, and that my relatively limited knowledge of film technique comes primarily from various Internet essayists (both text and video). So I'm in a somewhat difficult position – I'm convinced the film demonstrates amazing storytelling, but I'm far from an expert in deeply analysing them. The main reason I feel compelled to even try is, well, I can't find any kind of in-depth analysis of the storytelling in this film. Hell, I can't really find any analysis at all. I mean, without looking, I can guarantee there are some fairly complex analyses of recent films like La La Land, Moonlight, and even genre movies like Arrival and Shin Godzilla, and they're all deserving to their own degrees, but I'd easily consider Train to Busan as worthy of such discussion. So, since I can't find anything to help me understand why this film worked so well, I'm left to try and get my own thoughts down and attempt to work it out for myself.

When I initially started this piece, I was going to keep the spoilers to a minimum. That plan will go out the window by the end, but for the first few paragraphs at least I'm going to focus primarily on the clip below. For context, it takes place about a third of the way through the film after the passengers have disembarked from the zombie-infested high-speed train, at a station they believe is safe from the infection. As an aside, I love that this clip is available on YouTube. Not only do I feel it perfectly encapsulates everything I love about this film, but the lack of subtitles (a feature I wish were available on the Blu-ray) and no familiarity of the Korean language allows for a complete focus on the visual storytelling on display.

For arbitrary reasons, let's start with why I cared about all the characters so much. While it must be mentioned that the casting is amazing, the actors all charismatic, and the costume designs are visually distinct and striking, I feel there's more to it than that. If that was all it took, then I why did I care so much more for the characters in Train to Busan than those in a film with equally strong examples of those attributes, like The Force Awakens? There are vague terms I could throw around like "flawed", "likeable", "realistic" or even "badass", but I guess if I were to do a post-viewing analysis as to why I found these characters compelling, I think it comes down to a little bit of visually demonstrated personality, a little bit of understanding character behaviour, and a feeling sense that the characters are driving the story while remaining true to themselves.

Let's look at the clip above. Now, at first glance it would be easy to see this as just everyone running away from zombies, which in a way it is. But to paraphrase a quote or idea I once heard somewhere that's stuck with me (though for life of my I can't remember if it was in a storytelling, inspirational, or political context, weirdly enough), "We are not our situations – we are how we react to our situations". And that's exactly what's on display in that scene – yes, everyone is running away from a horde of zombies, but their distinct personalities and psychologies are evident in HOW they're reacting. The degree of their emotional responses, their body language, and especially who they prioritise (whether themselves or others) speak volumes about each of them.

Let's get more specific and look at the main cast of characters one by one. We first see Sang-hwa in the blue jacket descending on the escalator. He displays an immediate reaction of panic and fear upon seeing the oncoming zombie horde, but he follows this up with a (relatively speaking) calm and coordinated move of lifting his pregnant wife (Seong-kyeong) over onto the stairs before following himself. Later we see him risking his own life by charging to attack a zombie before it grabs the little girl Soo-an, and sticking around to hold the doors allowing the survivors more time to escape. So, on paper this sounds like he's a generic hero, but his facial expressions and body give him some more depth. Sure, he looks scared and concerned, but you can also see hints of frustration and perhaps even anger there, which I think is also expressed in the way he punches the zombies almost out of spite and annoyance. This reinforces earlier and later scenes which demonstrate his short temper, and can even be seen in the way he hurries the Homeless Man out of the way, and when he calls out to the business man Seok-woo to hurry up (hell, in the subtitles he calls him "Asshole"). As an aside, I've seen some websites claim Sang-hwa is meant to be a professional martial artist, but I don't agree. The actor who plays him is a mixed martial artist in real life, so I believe they may be projecting those attributes onto the character. If anything, to me the fighting looks scrappy, raw, and full of anger and annoyance, which feels a lot more appropriate for the character.

As for Seong-kyeong, while we don't see as much in this particular sequence, we can get more than just "pregnant wife" from her character. She too maintains a constant look of fear and panic, naturally, but like her husband she remains relatively focussed and in control. We see her run towards her husband and Soo-an, focussed primarily on getting the latter to safety. Before descending the steps to the station, we see her check out the window, showing her intelligence and attentiveness (also seen quickly after they're on the platform and she's looking around to ensure the coast is clear, whereas most everyone else is running in a blind state of panic). Soon after, we see them pause temporarily upon seeing the zombie that's fallen between the two elderly ladies, then move TOWARDS one of the ladies to help them, further demonstrating both being selfless. But even in this brief scene we see she may not be so perfect, namely in her reaction when the Homeless Man blocks the door. She clearly hesitates, perhaps worrying that letting him in would let a zombie in too (perhaps even worried he's become a zombie), and after she opens the door for him she steps back with a look of disgust on her face (which wouldn't be the only time themes of classism are brought up in the film).

Now let's look at Soo-an's father, the business man Seok-woo. As extra context for this scene, the reason he, Soo-ann, and the Homeless Man are on this walkway instead of descending with most of the others is because Seok-woo called a business associate in the area (listed in his phone as a "lemming" indicating both his position in the corporate hierarchy and his attitude towards those beneath him) to find out a way to avoid the quarantine they were all heading for (The Homeless Man overheard him on the phone). We first see him talking to his daughter, like he's trying to reassure her, before he walks towards the military officer across the walkway. But this isn't a typical "Everything is going to be okay, I'll be right back" type of reassurance – it's incredibly brief and detached, as evident when he immediately starts running away while Soo-ann visibly wipes tears from her eyes (tears shed because she was upset at her father's selfishness) and the camera zooms back to emphasise her feeling of abandonment. But while he may not care very much about Soo-ann's feelings, he clearly cares about her – as soon as he realises things have gone to shit, he immediately looks back and runs towards her. As for aspects of his character, as well as the business attire (which I should stress he didn't even really need to wear that day), his default expression of fear comes across as desperation and stress, and as when he's called over towards the glass doors by Sang-hwa he doesn't even consider helping anyone else on his way, only himself. We also see he's not a violent or aggressive person, perhaps exemplified by the fact he literally tried to fight off a zombie using a book.

Rounding out the rest of the cast (besides Soo-ann, whom I think I more or less covered across the previous entries), the Homeless Man is clearly a clumsy, panicking, even somewhat cowardly man (seen not just in his facial expressions and limp, but also in how he doesn't stay and help secure the glass doors), he's not completely selfish as evidenced by his brief assistance of Seok-woo with his coat. Yong-guk (the young male baseball player) is seen urging Jin-hee (his female friend) to escape, the latter hesitant to leave (and all of this is clearly told through maybe 3 seconds of body language), both showing their selflessness by his helping with the glass doors and her assisting others into the train. And finally we have the elderly business man Yon-suk, who is clearly not only scared and desperate but completely selfish. While he appears to grab someone and help them when they see the horde, this is only because that man was the train driver and hence somebody useful to him. Though this may come across as thoughtful, once he's on the train he hysterically grabs the train employee in a desperate plea to get the train moving, showing he only cares about his own safety. Then later once the door is closed does it again but more threateningly, even going so far as to shove aside Jin-hee when she objects.

As well as the above-mentioned visually-reinforced character traits, each character has a consistent psychology throughout. You constantly understand why each character behaves the way they do in every scene, so it never feels like a character is acting inexplicably or "stupidly" for the sake of raising the tension (unlike, say, the more recent Alien films). Even the arguable villain of the piece, Yon-suk, feels all too human and in a way pitiful, despite him acting consistently selfish and destructively.

So, that's enough about visual characterisation for now, so let's try and analyse some of the other storytelling techniques in this one scene (again, I'll stress I'm somewhat limited in my knowledge here, so bear with me). If there's one thing I'm a sucker for, it's a film with great editing. Hell, I'll admit that The Accountant is a bad film, but I thoroughly enjoyed the hell out of it because the editing was so damn good. In any case, Train to Busan is no exception. Even setting aside vague notions of the rhythm of scenes, and appropriate length of shots to let the emotional beats play out, there's just some solid cuts going on here. One of my favourite examples is the quick close up shot of Sang-hwa reacting to the horde before panning outwards, allowing the audience to become more invested in the situation by focusing on a personal reaction amidst the chaos. Another is right after the zombies attack the soldier pleading for help on the walkway. We pan from the Homeless Man to Seok-woo, cut to a close-up of him from the opposite angle turning around, then cut to where he's looking (his daughter waiting as commanded while chaos ensues behind her), then cut to his feet starting to run. It's simple but elegant motivated editing – seeing a person looking a direction and then cutting to their point of view – but it works.

Another of my favourite little techniques in this scene in the use of slow motion. It's common to see slow motion in other films used to make an action sequence seem more exciting or give it an epic feel, but here (like in its rare use throughout the rest of the film) it's used to emphasise the panic and desperation, mimicking what happens when the adrenaline kicks in (along with the sound drowning out). And like with one of the previous editing examples, it allows the audience to focus on another personal situation amongst the chaos, and also give us time to take in all that's happening in what is for the characters a short amount of time. As a cherry on top snapping back to real-time when the immediate danger is briefly alleviated with Sang-hwa's elbow gives that strike additional weight.

While it's hard to pin this down to a single technique, I must also really praise the film's sense of geography. Whether it's something vague like genius storyboarding or the above-mentioned motivated editing or what have you, you really do have a strong sense of where everyone and everything is in relation to each other in every scene and shot. Another classic example of this idea: the station shoot-out in The Untouchables. This may not seem relatively important, but as a recent example my enjoyment of the recent Free Fire was hindered because I was frequently confused as to the relative locations of all the characters. Now, you could argue that this sort of spacial awareness is harder to get across in a more open environment like an abandoned factory than a more two-dimentional setting like a train carriage, so it may be an unfair comparison, but I still feel that a little bit more understanding and cohesion like this can go a long way in terms of engagement.

Let's take a look at my favourite scene in the film, which I think exemplifies this idea perfectly. This scene comes much later in the film, so let’s raise the spoiler warning to the next level.

Even if you go into this scene fresh, you can tell exactly where everyone is in relation to each other, including the zombies, without ever showing the two main groups of characters in the same shot. It's mostly told through the framing and angles of each shot, and the editing flowing naturally from where each character is looking to what or whom they're looking at, and all in the space of less than 20 seconds. On top of that, the "Oh fuck" moment is beautifully executed. First we have the classic countdown, second we have the rising tense music with the slow zoom in, third we have the established pattern with the shots cutting back and forth between the two characters, and then finally that pattern and hence the tension is broken with perfect sound mixing – following up the isolated, enhanced sound of the soda can being crushed with deafening silence. Setting up the pattern, building the tension, then releasing it to maximum effect.

Speaking of tension, I must also take a moment to praise how Train to Busan manages to frequently raise it without feeling too contrived and forced. Focusing on the station escape sequence once more, the few moments where more shit hits the fan all feel believable and organic given what has already been established in previous scenes. A zombie runs into Seok-woo because it's already established that area is swarming with them. A few survivors accidentally open a carriage full of zombies because they were in too much of a panic to take the time to remember which carriage they came from and look through the window. Zombies crash through the glass walkway where we saw Seok-woo and the Homeless man earlier. Later on, the darkness caused tunnels becomes a major plot point, and again this feels genuine enough because firstly of course trains would go through tunnels, and secondly because it plays on an already-established and reinforced attribute of the zombies.

Now, if there's one thing I know less about than visual storytelling in films, its writing and story structure in films, but what the hell, let's have a crack at it. There's a term going around some parts of the web describing an ideal form of story structure, popularised by Matt Stone and Trey Parker of South Park fame - "Therefore/but". It basically boils down to character-driven cause-and-effect, and that's Train to Busan in a nutshell. For example, let's look at what happens after that station escape scene. The main characters are now split across three carriages, and which carriages they wound up in was determined by their character traits and actions during the escape. The fact they are now separated sets up the tension for the next stage in the plot – some characters try desperately to cross zombie-infested carriages to their loved ones, while others try to prevent their crossing due to fear of becoming infected. The actions each group of characters takes is completely consistent with their actions and choices during the previous scenes including the escape, and the progression of events feels organic and natural, with a logical progression and order. Contrast that with a film I watched only recently but with some similarities - 30 Days of Night. In that, you also have a small group of survivors that slowly dwindle, but the progression of events feels disconnected, like you could jumble up a majority of the set pieces and it would have as much impact. If Train to Busan demonstrates the "Therefore/but" idea of storytelling, then 30 Days of Night demonstrates the "And then" idea, where story beats often aren't impacted by what came before, and don't really influence what happens next.

Continuing on with storytelling and structure, another film I watched recently that gave me a little bit of inspiration was Their Finest. In it, a character comments that while (or perhaps because) in real life a person's death may not feel like it has a point or meaning, in a story a character's death absolutely must. And again, Train to Busan nails this idea almost perfectly. As well as the numerous nameless victims littered throughout to remind us of the constant threat and tension, almost every death of a main character (see below) is effective because it's either caused by another character's actions, it has a clear and distinct impact on the story or another character's arc, or a combination of the above. We care about the characters because they impact the story, and we mourns their deaths because we see how they impact the remaining characters. Compare this again with 30 Days of Night. Setting aside isolated deaths like heroic sacrifices or characters wondering off by themselves and dying, there are a couple of moments when we're clearly supposed to feel something when the main character is forced to put others out of their miseries. But these scenes fall flat primarily because the characters that die aren't well established or impactful, and because the main character's choice to kill them doesn't really feel like it's in service of any sort of clear development or arc. They're trying to come across as emotional, but they haven't earned it.

But here's where I must raise the spoiler warning level to maximum, because, believe it or not, I'm going to talk about what I think was the weakest part of the film and some other major plot points in the last third. Yes, believe it or not I'm going to not only be slightly negative about this film which I adore, but I'll even get a little pretentious and suggest an improvement.  

So let's talk about The Homeless Man. 

Now, I must say up front that the character's weaknesses have nothing to do with him being homeless. Rather, the character doesn't completely work because it's lacking in a lot of the qualities I've mentioned above. While his fear, clumsiness, and shock are all solidly depicted visually, his actions don't feel completely consistent. Just before the station escape clip, he's calmly and stubbornly refusing to leave the walkway because he overheard Seok-woo on his phone organising an alternate escape route, but at that time he was visually shown as still being in shock and hysterical. During the escape, his choosing to help Seok-woo by covering the attacking zombie with his coat also doesn't feel completely consistent with his desperation and clumsiness.

A friend of mine has a theory that by setting up the Homeless Man as an intruder on the train, along with the editing fake-out just before we first see him, the audience associates him with the infection and thus gets us off on the wrong foot. I agree, and would add that on top of that he is reinforced as a hindrance and liability for the group on at least two other occasions. But these might not have necessarily been death knells of audience empathy, and could've served as functional set-ups for a redemption death. In fact, let's take a closer look as his death scene.

Now, on paper this should've worked – the once-cowardly character here sacrifices himself so Soo-ann and Seong-kyeong can escape, culminating in a bleak yet almost beautiful sequence in which zombies pour through the breaking glass like gushing water. And yet whilst its far more stylish than the deaths of both Sang-hwa and Seok-woo, it falls completely flat emotionally. The reason, I think, is that unlike the other two deaths this one feels completely one sided - the tragedy is the Homeless Man and his alone, whereas the deaths affected other characters. Sang-hwa's death worked because he bonded with Seok-woo and helped him grow as a character, and Seok-woo's death REALLY worked because he tragically died just at the moment he finally became a decent father to Soo-ann. The Homeless Man needed some sort of relationship and arc associated with another character, and I believe there's an obvious candidate: Seong-kyeong.

As you can see in the clip, just before The Homeless Man dies, Seong-kyeong looks back at him, as if (from a storytelling perspective) it's meant to be a pay-off for an emotional beat that wasn't fully established or fleshed out (perhaps, and I should stress I'm completely speculating here, in a scene or two that were cut for whatever reason). I mentioned above how Seong-kyeong appears to briefly react to The Homeless Man with disgust and weariness when he jumps in their carriage at the infected station, so one possibility could be that her look was her coming to realising her own misguided prejudice of him. Personally, while this this fits into the themes of classism well enough, I don't think this works psychologically for Seong-kyeong at this moment – she's undoubtedly still mourning her husband, and THAT'S what the filmmakers could play off. Remember that clip above with the soda can? Just before that sequence, The Homeless Man was lagging too far behind, and after he steps on the can it leads to the situation where Sang-hwa is bitten by a zombie and doomed, so it's entirely possible that The Homeless Man could feel responsible in some way for Sang-hwa's death (or for Seong-kyeong to be even more disgusted in him). So all we'd need is an extra scene to reinforce one or both of these dynamics, perhaps after they're kicked out of the "safe" carriage or as they're walking along the tracks. After an accidental glance, the two shy their eyes away quickly, her in disgust and maybe hatred, and him in shame and guilt, all in the space of even 5 seconds, and that might've been enough. That way, The Homeless Man's death becomes not just a heroic sacrifice, but a moment of redemption for him, and forgiveness from her

As an aside, a further nit-pick of this scene is the forced setup. While I praised Train to Busan for cleverly raising the tension in previous scenes, here the cause is a literal fiery trainwreck that comes out of nowhere . Again, might be minor, but a sense of contrivance (even subconsciously) probably didn't help. 

Looking over all of this, it looks like I’ve only pointed out tried-and-true storytelling techniques – body language, character interactions, motivated editing, slow motion, basic sound mixing, cause and effect storytelling – and haven’t really highlighted anything truly experimental or innovative. But that’s exactly my point, and perhaps the reason why this film isn’t being talked about more and why I feel it should. Train to Busan doesn’t really break new ground in terms of storytelling, and if anything sticks quite rigidly to established tropes and cliches of the zombie genre, and yet it’s still incredible. So many recent big-budget blockbusters fail in these basic areas that we need films like Train to Busan to show everyone how it’s done.

Train to Busan doesn’t reinvent the wheel. It remembers why the wheel worked in the first place.

[unixcommerce]

Motivational Sales Quotes to Inspire You

Sales is a challenging vocation. But if you keep yourself and your team fired up, the rewards can be awesome.

So how do you get motivated? Is it with upbeat music? Or some exercise? Maybe a few words of praise?

How about some motivational sales quotes to inspire success!

Success is dependent on the drive and attitude of each individual salesperson. Even the most self-confident salesperson occasionally feels down due to a lost sale or pressure to meet quotas.

Motivation is key to thriving in today’s fast-paced, demanding world of sales.  And this collection of motivational sales quotes will give you the inspiration to keep going.  So if you manage a sales team, a sales quote might just be what’s needed to get everyone moving in the right direction.

Motivational Sales Quotes

There’s a lot of good advice for salespeople that comes in the form of a motivational quote. These business professionals quoted below offer gems of inspiration.

Approach each customer with the idea of helping him or her to solve a problem or achieve a goal, not of selling a product or service. ~ Brian Tracy (Author)

Keep the customer actively involved throughout your presentation, and watch your results improve. ~ Harvey Mackay (Businessman) 

Your competition is everything else your prospect could conceivably spend their money on. ~ Don Cooper (Seminar host)

When you’re coaching your sales reps, make sure your feedback is timely, consistent, objective, accurate, individualized and relevant. ~ Barry Trailer (Co-founder, CSO Insights)

Don’t sell life insurance. Sell what life insurance can do. ~ Ben Feldman (Businessman)

All things being equal, people will do business with and refer business to those people they know, like and trust. ~ Bob Burg (Author)

If you are not moving closer to what you want in sales (or in life), you probably aren’t doing enough asking. ~ Jack Canfield (Author)

To build a long-term, successful enterprise, when you don’t close a sale, open a relationship. ~ Patricia Fripp (Speaker) 

Make a customer, not a sale. ~ Katherine Barchetti (Founder, K. Barchetti Shops)

Why not create a welcome video from the CEO or a founder just for new sales reps? Make hearing the why both personal and motivating at the same time. ~ Trish Bertuzzi, (President, The Bridge Group)

Quotes for Overcoming Stress

Working in sales can be stressful. Because there are a variety of pressures heightening tension at any given moment. So if you suffer from sales related stress, these motivational sales quotes can help you battle through the anxiety.

The truth is that there is no actual stress or anxiety in the world; it’s your thoughts that create these false beliefs. You can’t package stress, touch it, or see it. There are only people engaged in stressful thinking. ~ Wayne Dyer (Author)

All progress takes place outside the comfort zone. ~ Michael John Bobak (Contemporary artist)

You know you are running a modern sales team when selling feels more like the relationship between a doctor and a patient and less like a relationship between a salesperson and a prospect. ~ Mark Roberge (SVP Sales and Services, HubSpot)

Opportunities don’t happen. You create them. ~ Chris Grosser (Speaker)

In times of great stress or adversity, it’s always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive. ~ Lee Lacocca (Former CEO, Chrysler Corporation)

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt (Former President of the US)

The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will. ~ Vince Lombardi (Football coach)

There is incredible power in leading with research and leading with relevance. ~ Kraig Kleeman, (Author)

Being in control of your life and having realistic expectations about your day-to-day challenges are the keys to stress management, which is perhaps the most important ingredient to living a happy, healthy and rewarding life. ~ Marilu Henner (Actress)

Positive Attitude Quotes

Maintaining a positive attitude is a crucial part of being a successful salesperson. The customer has to believe that YOU believe in what you’re selling. Below are motivational sales quotes that demonstrate the importance of attitude.

Either you run the day or the day runs you. ~ Jim Rohn (Author)

Sales are contingent upon the attitude of the salesman, not the attitude of the prospect. ~ William Clement Stone (Author)

I have never worked a day in my life without selling. If I believe in something, I sell it, and I sell it hard. ~ Estée Lauder (Founder, Estée Lauder Cosmetics Inc.)

I studied a housewife’s needs and we made a brush for every need. ~ Alfred Fuller (Founder, Fuller Brush Company)

Most people think ‘selling’ is the same as ‘talking’. But the most effective salespeople know that listening is the most important part of their job. ~ Roy Bartell (Sales thought leader)

The same wind blows on us all. What matters is not the blowing of the wind but the set of the sail. ~ Jim Rohn (Author)

The difference between enchantment and simple sales is that with enchantment you have the other person’s best interests at heart, too. ~ Guy Kawasaki (Venture capitalist)

Sales-driven cultures can really differentiate you from the majority of your competition. That doesn’t mean being salesperson oriented, just sales oriented: winning deals, smelling the blood and going in for the kill. ~ Josh James (CEO, Domo)

You have to generate revenue as efficiently as possible. And to do that, you must create a data-driven sales culture. Data trumps intuition. ~ Dave Elkington (CEO and founder, Inside Sales)

Lead TO what makes you unique, not WITH what makes you unique. ~ Matt Dixon (Author)

Sales Quotes to Remember

These are some motivational sales quotes that are worth keeping in mind. Especially in those moments when attempting to convert a customer. So always remember these great phrases.

Today is always the most productive day of your week. ~ Mark Hunter (Author)

Statistics suggest that when customers complain, business owners and managers ought to get excited about it. The complaining customer represents a huge opportunity for more business. ~ Zig Ziglar (Author)

The best salespeople know that their expertise can become their enemy in selling. At the moment they are tempted to tell the buyer what “he needs to do,” they instead offer a story about a peer of the buyer. ~ Mike Bosworth (Author)

In the middle of every difficulty lies opportunity. ~ Albert Einstein (Theoretical Physicist)

Prospecting: find the man with the problem. ~ Ben Friedman (Marketing professional)

Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is to try just one more time. ~ Thomas Edison (Inventor)

Don’t worry about failures, worry about the chances you miss when you don’t even try. ~ Jack Canfield (Author)

The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. ~ Thomas Paine (Political activist)

Nobody likes to be sold to, but everybody likes to buy. ~ Earl Taylor (Real estate broker)

There’s no lotion or potion that will make sales faster and easier for you – unless your potion is hard work. ~ Jeffery Gitomer (Author)

Quotes To Overcome Fear

Being a good salesperson requires a lot of hard work and different skills. It can be intimidating. These motivational sales quotes will help you overcome your fear.

Sales is not about selling anymore but building trust and educating. ~ Siva Devaki (Founder, Mansa Systems)

Develop training modules. Celebrate successes. Share social-selling best practices throughout your entire company. And track the results. ~ Liz Gelb-O’Connor (VP Inside Sales Strategy & Growth, ADP)

Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great. ~ John D. Rockefeller (Business magnate)

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage. ~ Anais Nin (American-Cuban-French essayist)

The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. ~ Amelia Earhart (Aviation pioneer)

We generate fears while we sit. We overcome them by action. ~ Dr. Henry Link (Author)

I’d rather regret the things I’ve done than regret the things I haven’t done. ~ Lucille Ball (Actress)

If you’re doing prospecting, it’s not profitable to focus on smaller customers. Your ideal outbound customer should represent the largest revenue size or opportunity you can find that you can likely win. ~ Aaron Ross (Author)

Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you. ~ Thomas Jefferson (Former President of the US)

Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear. ~ George Addair (Real estate developer)

Quotes to Kick-Start Your Sales Career

Perseverance is key to success. But even the best of us struggle when experiencing hard times. Below we offer up some excellent motivational quotes to kick-start your sales career.

What differentiates sellers today is their ability to bring fresh ideas. ~ Jill Konrath (Author)

The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing. ~ Walt Disney (Entrepreneur)

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. ~ Mark Twain (Writer)

When you have a multi-tiered sales effort, the first thing you want to do is understand the market. You want to go out there and map the competitive landscape. You want to know what your customers are saying. ~ Brian Frank (Global Head of Sales Operations, LinkedIn)

Setting goals is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible. ~ Tony Robbins (Author)

Sales 2.0 is a combination of the data, science, metrics and predictability that inside sales has always been known for combined with the art of really getting close to our customers and understanding what they are facing in their businesses. ~ Anneke Seley (Founder, Reality Works)

A goal is a dream with a deadline. ~ Napolean Hill (Self-help author)

If you’re offered a seat on a rocket ship, don’t ask what seat! Just get on. ~ Sheryl Sandberg (COO, Facebook)

It is not necessary to do extraordinary things to get extraordinary results. ~ Warren Buffett (CEO, Berkshire Hathaway)

Become the person who would attract the results you seek. ~ Jim Cathcart (Speaker)

Overcome Failure Quotes

As a sales professional, it’s easy to focus on small failures when compared to your overall success. And yet those small failures serve to become your stepping stones to glory. So don’t sweat the small stuff.

Success is walking from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm. ~ Winston Churchill (Former British Prime Minister)

Failure is success if we learn from it. ~ Malcolm Forbes (Publisher, Forbes magazine)

Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough. ~ Og Mandino (Author)

Learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t live long enough to make them yourself. ~ Eleanor Roosevelt (Former First Lady of the US)

It’s really all about the leads. Do your best to always move from less assertive methodologies to those that are more assertive and more effective. That’s where the results are. ~ Ken Krogue (President, Inside Sales)

Don’t watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going. ~ Sam Levenson (Humorist)

Relevant prospect intelligence, plugged into planned, practiced, persuasive and proven messaging, repeated persistently, with a positive attitude = sales results. ~ Art Sobczak (Founder, Business By Phone Inc.)

It is the ability to resist failure or use failure that often leads to greater success. ~ J.K. Rowling (Author)

When we give ourselves permission to fail, we, at the same time, give ourselves permission to excel. ~ Eloise Ristad (Writer)

There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work and learning from failure. ~ Colin Powell (Former US National Security Advisor)

Customer point of view. Always. Filter everything you’re doing, saying and pitching through that and you’ll improve just about every metric you care about today. ~ Matt Heinz (President, Heinz Marketing)

Sales Quotes to Achieve Success

It’s worth having a list of motivational sales quotes to remind you why you want to be successful in the first place. These are some thoughtful musings on achieving success.

There is always room at the top. ~ Daniel Webster (Former U.S. Secretary of State)

Think about the customer’s business and what business problem they are trying to address. This helps you take a solution-centric approach to the sale. ~ Donal Daly (Founder, The TAS Group)

You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do. ~ Henry Ford (Industrialist)

The most crucial characteristic you should be hiring for is drive. ~ Kevin Gaither, (VP Inside Sales, ZipRecruiter)

The modern sales professional doubles as an information concierge — providing the right information to the right person at the right time in the right channel. ~ Jill Rowley (Social Selling Evangelism and Enablement, Oracle)

The salesperson who delivers the most valuable information to their customer or prospect first, wins the game. ~ Dave Orrico (VP of Enterprise Sales, Inside Sales)

You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.  ~ C.S. Lewis (Writer)

Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice. ~ Wayne Dyer (Author and speaker)

Human beings have an innate inner drive to be autonomous, self-determined, and connected to one another, and when that drive is liberated, people achieve more and live richer lives. ~ Daniel Pink (Author)

If you are not taking care of your customer, your competitor will. ~ Bob Hooey (Author)

View more motivational quotes for business in our image gallery:

Hundreds More Here!

Image: Depositphotos.com

This article, “Motivational Sales Quotes to Inspire You” was first published on Small Business Trends

https://smallbiztrends.com/

The post Motivational Sales Quotes to Inspire You appeared first on Unix Commerce.

from WordPress https://ift.tt/32pS4Ou via IFTTT

[scrappycoco8000]

YouTube’s latest effort to offer more ways for creators to make money is a positive sign that the company has been listening to users’ concerns, but it doesn’t resolve the bigger problems that have been hurting creators’ ability to make money on the platform in the first place. New monetization features, including expansive merchandise opportunities, paid stickers for live stream chats, and various channel membership tiers were all announced by YouTube chief product officer Neal Mohan yesterday at VidCon. “These new products are not some small little experiments,” Mohan told The Verge, adding that existing paid features are now bringing in revenue for “thousands and thousands” of channels. But there was no mention of the problems that have kept creators from succeeding with YouTube’s traditional advertising model in recent months, like uncertainty around revenue and power struggles with record labels. “Patreon makes up the biggest slice of our pie,” essayist Lindsay Ellis told The Verge, noting that she and her team are currently “at war” with label Universal Music Group (UMG). “Patreon usually makes up about 50 to 60 percent of our revenue every month, and advertising makes up about 30 percent.” Creators have realized they can’t rely on YouTube’s advertising model to sustain their careers. Those ads can vanish for any number of reasons: their video could be shut down by a questionable copyright claim, they could be punished for violating YouTube’s often selectively enforced rules, or another creator could do something outlandishly bad, leading advertisers to pull money from the platform and hurting the entire community. Being able to earn money directly from fans allows creators to supplement their income from ads and also insulate themselves from the uncertainty that comes from relying on a single, unpredictable revenue stream. It isn’t a solution to the actual problems around advertising, though. YouTube did address one long-standing problem creators face this week by updating its copyright claim policies and making them a little easier to deal with. Owners of copyrighted content will now have to define the exact location in a video where their material appears, clarifying the complaint and giving people the ability to edit out said material. But even with new initiatives to give YouTubers more power, anxiety among the community hasn’t disappeared. The dominating relationship record labels and TV networks have with YouTube has been concerning to individual creators. Record labels and studios pull in the majority of revenue from YouTube Premium subscriptions (which offer ad-free viewing and music streaming), says Anthony D’Angelo, a YouTube creator and former director of the Internet Creators Guild. Record labels take 70 percent of every dollar spent by Premium subscribers, D’Angelo said. The other 30 percent is split between YouTube and creators. (The Verge reached out to YouTube for confirmation, but didn’t hear back by time of publication.) “The fact that YouTube Red, or now YouTube Premium, were bound up with the streaming service but then pitched to creators as this very ‘pro-creator’ service is a big problem,” D’Angelo said. “We know for certain that YouTube Premium views do bring in more revenue than a typical view, but the lion’s share of that revenue goes to the music industry. That’s fundamentally unfair, and most people aren’t aware of this.” A lack of transparency around advertising revenue has also distressed the community. YouTube commentators â€" those who other people in the YouTube community look to for insight into the industry â€" like h3h3Productions’s Ethan Klein, Nerd City, and even Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg, have spoken about this being one of the worst times on YouTube for those who are trying to make money from advertising. It’s more unpredictable than ever when it comes to guessing what labels will claim. Jimmy “MrBeast” Donaldson tweeted about losing more than “five figures” on a video because of a claim that he didn’t understand, and Klein led a campaign against YouTube to boycott UMG â€" a frequent target of creators’ ire over copyright claims â€" after YouTube announced a new deal with the record label. Ad revenue remains the key way for creators to make money on YouTube, but many creators, including Ellis and performer Natalie Wynn, see access to other forms of revenue as a necessity. Both Ellis and Wynn have popular Patreon accounts, and both told The Verge that knowing they have consistent revenue coming in from subscribers allows them to create content on YouTube without feeling like they have to worry as much about losing ads. Ellis has learned to deal with copyright issues by keeping clips to under three seconds, hoping they will be seen as fair use, but it doesn’t always work. https://adstoppipro.com/blog/youtubes-alternative-monetization-strategy-is-a-good-step More blog here Via Adstoppi Blog : Blog Read more : Adstoppi

[alaimhcounselling]

13 Tips to Quit Smoking Naturally in 2019

Build your desire to stop smoking Naturally

[caption id="attachment_1355" align="alignright" width="320"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

The first step to quit smoking is one’s willingness. One’s strong intention to leave smoking can bring you success.

“The amount of good luck coming your ways depends on your willingness to act”

- says famous American writer Barbara Sher.

So, your journey of quitting this habit starts with your intention to leave it forever. Be it today, tomorrow, this month or next month, once you have set your goal, be determined to that firmly. Remember, nothing can defeat a strong determination.

Prepare a new routine for yourself

[caption id="attachment_1333" align="alignleft" width="372"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Once you have decided to quit your smoking habit, its time to prepare a new routine for yourself. Take time and plan how you will change your regular habit.

Famous author John C Maxwell said,

“You will never change your life until you change something you do daily. The secret of your success is found in your daily routine”.

Hence, anticipate when and why you smoke the most and find alternatives accordingly.  Some of the most common triggers that increase smoking cravings happen after meal, while drinking tea or coffee, during alone time, stressful moment or social gatherings. As a solution to it, you can have a walk immediately after meal or brush your teeth, drink juice instead of coffee, do yoga or meditation to lessen your stress etc.

Try Stop Smoking with Self Hypnosis

Hypnotherapy provides clients with a safe, drug free way to make those necessary yet often difficult changes, break bad habits and take control of their life in general. Over time, the old myths related to this therapy option have subsided.

Remember you really should want to alter those old behaviours, as well as results of hypnotherapy may differ from one person to another.

Hypnosis to stop smoking can be a positive step in the direction of attaining your objectives of a much healthier, better life.

Remind the risks at least once a day

[caption id="attachment_1326" align="alignright" width="341"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

After you have decided to quit smoking, highlight on the risk factors of smoking.

"Smoking kills half of all lifetime smokers."

- Dr. Alex Bobak, Anti-smoking group, SCAPE.

Whenever you get distracted with “Just one Smoke” craving, remember what have led you at this level to quit smoking. Focus on the increased physical and mental risks associated with it and how you can lead a healthy life by refraining yourself from the habit. The more you remind the risks, the more encouraged you will be to quit smoking. Some daily practices, for example- reading anti-smoking blogs, YouTube videos, documentaries will encourage you to quit smoking easily.

Alternate your food and drink habits

[caption id="attachment_1336" align="aligncenter" width="517"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Changing some of your food and drink habits is going to make your quit journey more convenient.

“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food”

-Hippocrates, Greek Physician.

Some food and drinks enhance your craving for smoking and make it more satisfying. Avoid red meat, cola, caffeine, alcohol etc. for a couple of days during your quit period.  Instead, drink a glass of milk if your craving happens because milk or dairy products do not combine well with cigarettes, eat plenty amount of fresh fruits and vegetables instead to lessen your nicotine addiction.

Remove all your smoking accessories

[caption id="attachment_1338" align="alignleft" width="219"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Remove all your accessories that remind you of smoking or can increase your temptation for smoking. Leave those behind and move forward.

“Let us move forward with strong and active faith”

- Franklin D. Roosevelt.

 Remove your ashtray, lighter, even one single piece of cigarette from your room, office desk or car. Keep no sign of your smoking habit near you.

Socialize with non-smoking groups

[caption id="attachment_1340" align="alignright" width="374"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Leave companion of your smoker friends and associate yourself with people who do not smoke and believe in same ideology.

“A pleasant companion is as good as a coach”,

-Jonathan Swift, Essayist.

 Befriends with some non-smoking groups, go to anti-smoking workshops, seminars etc. to keep yourself motivated in your quit journey. People who do not smoke, will constantly encourage you to keep going and not to smoke ever again.

Spend time with family members, kids and elders

[caption id="attachment_1342" align="alignleft" width="387"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Family is the center of love, affection and loyalty.

“Families are the compass that guides us. They are the inspiration to reach great heights and our comfort when we occasionally falter”,

-Brad Henry, former governor of Oklahoma.

  One usually does not light up a cigarette in front of family members, elders or children. So, spend time with your family members, tell them about your determination to quit smoking. They can be your biggest source of motivation in your quit journey.

Do some “Physical Exercise”

[caption id="attachment_1344" align="alignright" width="410"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Ensuring Physical fitness through exercise can be useful to beat nicotine addiction.

“Physical exercise is not only one of the most important keys to a healthy body, it is the basis of dynamic and creative intellectual activity”,

-John F Kennedy.

  Studies show that medium level of physical exercises such as aerobic exercise for an hour a day lessen the crave to smoke and withdrawal symptoms. Also, physical activities such as morning walk, jogging in the fresh air can be very effective to combat smoking habit.

  Do meditation, yoga, listen to music

[caption id="attachment_1345" align="alignleft" width="266"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Smoking is not only a physical addiction to nicotine, it is also a physiological urge during tough situations like stress, depression and anger. Hence, give yourself some inner peace and relief.

“Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.”

- Gautama Buddha.

Craving to smoke usually last for 10 to 15 minutes. So, indulge yourself into meditation, yoga or prayer to heal your inner soul. You can also listen to your favorite music, songs to refresh your mind. Remember, smoking a cigarette cannot provide inner relief. Great article worth reading on how to quit smoking naturally with yoga.

  Take support from medical advisor, counselor

[caption id="attachment_1349" align="alignright" width="341"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

You can receive medical assistance from your doctor or counsellor. Medical support, for example- Nicotine Replacement Theory can be an option.

The medical support depends on your gender, health condition, your smoking pattern etc. So, if you think you heavily depend on smoking and determine to quit it, get an appointment with your doctor and follow the instructions accordingly.

Have- “I can do it” belief

[caption id="attachment_1348" align="alignleft" width="306"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Your self-belief is the key of your success. No matter how much addicted you are to smoking cigarette, have a firm belief on yourself and your decision.

“If you don’t give up on something you truly believe in, you will find a way.”

-Roy T. Bennett, The light in the heart.

You may fail in between, light up a cigarette after resisting yourself for a whole day and get frustrated about it. But giving up is never an option and you must harbor your practice. Talk to yourself, write “I have quit smoking” in a paper and repeat it every day. If you have fall, believe in yourself and get going again.

Reward Yourself

[caption id="attachment_1350" align="alignright" width="404"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Reward yourself with something good.

“Don’t forget to love yourself”

- Soren Kierkegaard, Danish Philosopher.

Treat yourself with a pleasant thing if you could resist your craving today or did not smoke a single cigarette for a week. Your love for yourself can encourage you not to light up a single cigarette again.

Remember- “Its better late than never”

[caption id="attachment_1352" align="alignleft" width="291"] 13 tips to quit smoking[/caption]

Always believe that its better late than never and today is the high time you changed your life.

“The future depends on what you do today.”

-Mahatma Gandhi.

Some Smokers feel afraid to quit smoking because they believe it’s been long. Some think they will quit it once they grow old. However, today is the best time to change your life. So, if you have decided to quit smoking, don’t hesitate to start it from today. Don’t lose a single day, start from today and success will be yours.

Just remember New Year New You.

Originally Post Here: 13 Tips to Quit Smoking Naturally in 2019 more about authorGateway Wellness Suites, The Reeks,

[hon394criminalminds]

Challenge Post 11: Stories Coming from Inside the “Big House.”

https://www.wbez.org/series/written-inside/7b02369b-9927-472b-a5cc-c16ae7bab94dEven though there are myriad “prison narratives” out there, told mostly via the glossy methods of Hollywood or mainstream television, it’s very difficult to find honest, engaging representations of life inside American’s prisons. I have discovered that in this “age of the podcast,” the genre is particularly adept at allowing us to see what it is like to live inside prison walls.  In fact, there seems to be a growing number of prison podcasts at the moment, perhaps because the genre is less invasive and can allow for recordings that are less likely to compromise security than video cameras and more able to “capture” the immediate moment than fiction.  I introduced you to Ear Hustle, told from within the walls of San Quentin, a maximum-security state prison for men near San Francisco.  Another podcast that I’ve found particularly interesting in depicting  issues around incarceration and prison life is Written Inside, which is adapted from essays written by prisoners at Stateville Correctional Center near Chicago.  While clearly more edited than the stories in Ear Hustle, this podcast provides a very intimate look at prison life.  CHeck it out here:  https://www.wbez.org/series/written-inside/7b02369b-9927-472b-a5cc-c16ae7bab94d

I also find that poetry can provide the “outsider” with a much more vivid understanding of prison life, or of a prisoner’s anxieties, frustrations, and experiences.  I’ll leave this poem by JOseph Aragon for you to consider.  He was a prolific poet and essayist who wrote frequently about his prison experiences, especially his time in isolation, and lobbied for the end of the practice of prolonged isolation as punishment for inmates before his death in 2015

My challenge to you is to find some sort of story from “the inside” that you feel provides useful insight into prison life.  Look for something that seems more intimate, honest, real than what you might have posted about in relation to Orange is the New Black, a dramatized version of a real former inmate’s experience. 

[melissawsr]

THE ARCHIVES: Issue 1, No. 1

In 1960 John Severson published the first issue of “The Surfer.” Its 36 pages were a compilation of photos he took while filming “Surf Fever,” his own illustrations, some editorial, and a few ads. Flyers announcing “The Surfer is coming!” were pasted the windows of surf shops. Former Surfer Magazine Publisher Steve Pezman told the Los Angeles Times “I promptly stole the flyer off the wall of the surf shop, which was how hungry we[surfers] were for printed validation.” Surfers lined up to buy copies. Many surfers’ earliest memories of Surfer is being a grom and thumbing through it with friends. Somebody would bring the latest issue to school, and try to pull it out of their backpack without it getting ripped to shreds by a pack of fellow frothers. Huddled around the mag, pages would turn, guesses of where the spots in the photos were shouted out, cases pleaded as to why they were right or wrong. Analyzing, absorbing and critiquing every aspect of the magazine before cutting out prime stoke-inducing photos to be scotch-taped to a bedroom wall surf collage—a Surfer Magazine reader tradition that seems to transcend the decades. As we grew older, we'd thumb through a mag looking for our favorite writers, storytellers, and photographers. We searched for photos and tales of exotic waves to spark our own travel missions. We hunted for shots of our most cherished surfers. We sought connection in the words of thoughtful essayists. It's hard to remember now in our digital age, but we even flipped through the pages looking for cutting-edge surf news. Over the years, the stories, photos, art direction and the ads in Surfer became little time capsules for our surfing lives. To celebrate those moments, to capture a bit of nostalgia, we're announcing a new video series called "The Surfer Archives." Each week we'll be pulling an issue from the canon that is Surfer's archive and dropping a video of it getting the ole' thumb through. Take a stroll down nostalgia lane and enjoy. If there’s a specific issue you’d like to see, feel free to let us know. [Read More ...] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpGvJZjExeU

[festivalists]

Planet youth

From left to right: Ngọc Nick M, Aswathy Gopalakrishnan, Adham Youssef, Petra Meterc; photo: courtesy of IFF Rotterdam

As every year, International Film Festival Rotterdam invites a bunch of young talents from all over the world to represent the new generation of journalists and critics, and Yoana Pavlova is there to interview them. Only this time Festivalists was officially part of the education process, and be it because of the zeitgeist, or because of the 2017 trainee selection, the conversation revolved around the existing politics of cinema and festivals' Realpolitik, as well as around the audiovisual future of criticism.

In a festival like Rotterdam that grew and grew until it became Planet IFFR, projects that focus on young film critics might look like small asteroids. This makes the contact even more valuable and heartening. Take each one of these trainees, though, and you would discover a whole universe, an accomplished professional with different background, interests, taste.

Ngọc Nick M wrote on the controversial Vietnamese horror KFC. Aswathy Gopalakrishnan interviewed filmmakers like Rahmatou Keïta and Julian Rosefeldt, weighting also on the Hivos Tiger Award winner SEXY DURGA. Adham Youssef talked to the creative duo behind CAIRO JAZZMAN. Petra Meterc reported on the Jan Němec's retrospective launch and met the hope of German cinema Julian Radlmaier.

Still and all, the four have one thing in common – their capacity and drive to capitalize on the IFFR experience.

Yoana Pavlova: My first question is related to your decision to take part in the IFFR Trainee Project for Young Film Critics – were you familiar with the festival before applying, or it was the information about the project that caught your attention in the first place?

Ngọc Nick M: Before Rotterdam, I had participated in Tokyo International Film Festival in Japan three times and some local festivals in my country (Vietnam) as a journalist. This is my first experience at an European film festival. To me, IFFR is one of the most important events in the film industry. Numerous Vietnamese filmmakers wish to submit their features or shorts to Rotterdam. At the end of October last year, I was made aware of the IFFR Trainee Project for Young Film Critics through a new friend who works for IFFR as a programmer. I immediately applied, because it would have been a great opportunity to explore IFFR and improve my writing skills. Furthermore, I will be 30 in October this year, so IFFR Trainee Project for Young Critics 2017 was my last chance for this program.

Aswathy Gopalakrishnan: Yes, I had heard of IFFR before, since the Hivos Tiger Competition section is quite well-known in the filmmaking / film journalism circles in India. A few years ago, THE IMAGE THREADS / CHITRA SUTRAM (2010), a film by the young Indian director Vipin Vijay, had been screened at the festival. The name of the fest is what caught my interest initially.

Adham Youssef: I was familiar with the project IFFR had for young film critics, but I did not know the actual details. I knew from the start that IFFR was a festival with a rather informal mechanism which welcomes young people and talents, especially in the filmmaking area, and gives them the opportunity to experience and learn. This really encouraged me to apply and to be part of this year’s selection.

Petra Meterc: I heard a lot of interesting things about the Rotterdam festival, and this autumn I realized they also organize the IFFR Trainee Project for Young Critics, so it was the combination of wanted to experience both.

YP: To what degree this festival edition, including the Trainee Project, met your expectations?

NNM: I am greatly satisfied with my experience at this year’s IFFR. I watched more than 10 films that would be difficult to find in cineplexes in Vietnam, such as NOCTURAMA (2016), YOURSELF AND YOURS / DANGSINJASINGWA DANGSINUI GEOT (2016), AMERICAN HONEY (2016), and MOONLIGHT (2016). Moreover, director Barry Jenkins’ masterclass and two expert meetings with experienced film critics Jay Weissberg and Clarence Tsui have inspired me tremendously. As an IFFR Trainee, with my three new friends from Slovenia, India, and Egypt I acted as a member of the FIPRESCI jury for the Bright Future section. It was my first time as a jury member, and it was quite a terrific moment debating and picking the winner.

AG: Regarding the trainee project, I had not much idea how the programme would be, when I arrived in Rotterdam. This was my first such experience ever. I was just glad to be a part of it. This project helped me mitigate the doubts I had as a film critic, at least to a large extent. The discussions and mentor sessions with people like Jay Weissberg were really insightful. The festival had a warm, amiable ambience that would make any cinephile feel at home.

AY: For this edition, I was very satisfied with the film selection, which was very rich and diverse. The programming as well as the ability to capture several themes and merge them into the large scope of the festival’s objective were really fascinating. The same goes for the organization of the festival and the dedication of the staff. Personally, from an artistic and logistical points of view, IFFR is one of the international festivals that really stands out, and which will continue to inspire more people in the field of film. This year’s Trainee Project had more of a free-for-all agenda, when approaching the interns and their work. The coordinators, fortunately, trusted the trainees to set their own schedules and plan their own interviews. I really liked the approach, compared with the experiences of former trainees whom I met, who mentioned that there was a rather pyramid-like structure when it came to assignments and mentoring, which was accompanied by deadline pressure and stress, something I am glad I did no experience on my first festival abroad. The coordinators also highlighted for us certain events or figures that needed attention, or which they needed to have the spotlight on. I do not mind getting assignments. I think it is part of the experience, to be challenged to go outside of your comfort zone, maybe with topics or artists you are not very aware of. The mentorship sessions, despite several logistical difficulties, were successful, in my opinion. All the trainees this year had previous publishing experiences, but the mentoring sessions were effective in showing how editors usually look and evaluate articles. Also receiving live feedback in a group session is always, for me at least, a good experience, to get challenged and remain critical of your work and hoping for more improvement. I would have hoped, however, for more coordinated sessions with experts, like for example editors, video essayists, or broadcast show hosts, mainly individuals who would share experiences that do not necessarily have to do with film journalism. Another issue that I would have liked was to coordinate more with the people from the daily printed newsletter. I think to have a review or a report published would have been for the trainees an achievement in the whole experience of the festival.

PM: The festival edition met my expectations regarding the programme and the general atmosphere there, however I did not know what to expect from the Trainee Project. I think the project gave me a lot of valuable experience, especially by meeting experts from the same field of work and, of course, by having the chance to meet other young critics from all over the world and the possibility to discuss film, work, and so much more with them.

YP: What would you change from your festival stay, if you could go back in time?

NNM: I wish we could have met you from the very first day. At the beginning, I was a bit confused about what to do during my stay, so I just went to selected screenings. After our meetings with you, I had a clearer direction of what to achieve throughout the festival.

AG: Maybe I would try to pick films to watch more carefully. This time, I chose films randomly, and later I realized that I missed out a few must-watch films. But in general, I am happy with what I experienced at the festival. I wish I could go back in time, not to change anything, but just be there and watch many more films.

AY: I would have changed two things. Having a more organized schedule is the first. Being a rookie at a mega festival like Rotterdam that includes dozens of exciting daily screenings and events left me at times confused and being unable to organize. I managed to watch as many films as I could, whether in theatrеs or in the video library, but nevertheless I think I needed more discipline when organizing my festival plan. Another thing I would have intensified was expanding my networking skills more and more. I think I did enough this year, again for a first-timer. In the future, I guess I need to further develop this skill, which I now know is crucial in this field.

PM: I would probably wish for some additional meetings with various experts who would advise us on our writing, on work opportunities, and work conditions. I would also wish to collaborate a bit more with the IFFR blog team.

YP: Could you please tell me a little bit more about this year's Trainee Project, the way you experienced it, what was the most useful thing you learned?

NNM: IFFR Trainee Project has given me a valuable learning experience on the independent and experimental cinema. As a journalist, I obtained an overview of how the festival is run, from the screenings to the parties and the audience contribution, how to network, how to use the catalogue, and how to distribute my time during the festival. I personally love the atmosphere of IFFR the most. Each screening was full with excited audience, even for those aspiring directors from different corners of the world. I could feel a strong sense of diversity here. As a FIPRESCI jury member, I learned how to judge the competition and improve my debating skills. As a young film critic, I tried to watch and review films I had seen. And you helped enthusiastically with editing my reviews.

AG: I learned that it is important – very, very important – to be honest. It is important to not get carried away by the popular opinions, and express our own views freely and clearly. That kind of courage and honesty will definitely make the review read many times better.

AY: I think I answered the main part of this question above. However, concerning the part of what I learned, I would like to say a couple of things: The first is that the very vague and problematic term “independent cinema” was deconstructed for me in my experience at this festival. Ultimate freedom to make a film is a type of freedom that artists are not yet granted. As an individual coming from the so called “developing” part of this world, I concluded that filmmakers, even at the very prestigious festivals, are still restricted. Of course, not by censorship or by banning, like what happens in many cases, but by being tempted, for funding purposes, to present narratives that appeal to the other part of the world, the “developed” countries. Narratives that get easily digested in Europe and the US. But I must say that my argument is still not fully ripe. I am very encouraged to investigate this topic more and more, especially given that it is very critical to individuals and institutions who very much value the idea of “independent art,” and take it for granted, without reading between the lines of its politics and economics. I think I should also start to speak to more filmmakers to understand the aspects of funding, because it is very important. Second, out of honesty, I have to say that I have outgrown ideas that writing about film is an activity that makes me happy and pleased. My experience in the festival opened my horizons into the “industry” side of the film criticism. Also, it opened my eyes to the politics and agenda that can surround this activity. Finally, regardless of these last two critical points, I can safely say that despite all of the horrors that we see in this world, cinema remains a tool for human beings to express, question, and challenge, and propagate ideas. This sounds like a cliche, but it has to be said. The amount of talent, passion, and effort I saw in the films I watched, made me further believe in the medium of film.

PM: The Trainee Project enabled us to fully experience the festival; we did some writing for the IFFR blog as well as for our home affiliations, we had a few expert meetings, and joined the FIPRESCI jury with their decision-making on the FIPRESCI award. Probably the most useful thing that I had the chance to experience is how to write a review immediately after attending a film screening. I believe it is a special skill to be prepared to write right after watching a film and to do that as fast as possible.

YP: What was your personal highlight of the festival (film, special event, person)?

NNM: My personal highlight of the festival was the chance to meet Adham, Aswathy, and Petra. It was our first time at IFFR, and we had a great time. I remember the days we woke up at 8 am to catch the tram #7 to De Doelen. After breakfast, we explored IFFR in our own way. Some spent their time in the video library, some joined meetings, and others went for interviews. I would like to say thanks to the IFFR Trainee Project for connecting us. Everything was so fresh, and I cherished every second at IFFR. I will always remember the moment we unanimously selected German film SELF-CRITICISM OF A BOURGEOIS DOG / SELBSTKRITIK EINES BÜRGERLICHEN HUNDES (2017) as our favorite from the Bright Future section, and the debate with the FIPRESCI Award jury. Additionally, the MOONLIGHT screening and Barry Jenkins’ masterclass were also the high points of IFFR.

AG: The meeting with the FIPRESCI jury was a great experience. So were the sessions with Jay Weissberg and Clarence Tsui. Even more interesting were the discussions and negotiations in which we, the four young trainees, had to choose the one film to vote for. We have different tastes in films, so it was not easy to arrive at a conclusion. We would watch the films, make (long) notes on why we liked / disliked a certain aspect of the film, and put forth our view when the team would meet for a coffee afterwards. I had never had a more meticulous and interesting movie-watching experience.

AY: I cannot say I have a single highlight. However, an event that I really appreciated was getting to see Hungarian film director Béla Tarr, in the flesh. Although I did not get the opportunity to attend his masterclass, I managed to meet him in a very informal and quick manner afterwards, unfortunately without getting to ask questions or even probably introduce myself. Nevertheless, it was mind-blowing to see a living legend, whose work defined different schools of filmmaking. Other meetings that I really enjoyed, where I got to ask questions and talk about my experience, were those with film critics like Jay Weissberg and Clarence Tsui. I think those meetings were beneficial, as both critics really addressed different aspects of the film criticism business. I am glad they did not limit to discussion of the platonic image of film criticism, being a romantic job, but stressed on many challenges, such as meeting deadlines, being limited to a certain editorial policy, or even pros and cons of attending festivals, etc. Also the fact that both are not just big names in the industry, but also academics who wrote longer film analysis, was really interested to me as my approach to film criticism usually tackles sociopolitical aspects in the film and not just the aesthetics.

PM: Although I liked the Trainee Project and of course the films that we got to see at the festival, I must say that the personal highlight was the three other young critics that were in the project with me. I learned a lot from them and really enjoyed being in their company. One of the most interesting and valuable part of the programme for me was probably the Black Rebels panel – it was amazing !

YP: Now with this Trainee Project in your CV, how do you see your future in the filed of film journalism and criticism? Is there a certain aspect of the profession you feel like you need to master?

NNM: I will continue to develop my journalist and critic's career by writing more articles and reviews, doing more interviews. However, I will try to write more in English in order to reach more readers. Also, I want to promote the IFFR Trainee Project to young Vietnamese who want to work in the field of film journalism and criticism, so they could apply in the coming years. With my new connections from IFFR, I hope to create a network for Vietnamese filmmakers to help introduce their works to international film festivals like Rotterdam.

AG: Now there are vlogs and video essays which are becoming more popular. There are interesting ways to use social media in film criticism. While it is important to not lose sight of the true essence of film criticism, it is also important to update oneself constantly and make our voice be heard. Nowadays, anyone who has some time to spare and a little flair for writing thinks he can be a film critic. There is a surge in the number of such amateurs. It is important to learn about films more – look at it as an academic discipline. That will make our writings stand out of the pile.

AY: Personally, whenever I attend a film workshop or hangout with a group of film critics, or directors, or individuals from the industry in general, I keep a notebook to write the amount of names of directors, films, movements I do not know of. My experience in Rotterdam left me with dozens of names I need to explore and learn about. The experience also left me eager to further practice different kinds of criticism, and not to limit myself to a single genre, all under the title of a film critic. However, the type that I would like to further develop my skills in is longer essays that focus more on using films and movements as a tool to deconstruct and understand society and politics.

PM: I think my next step should be trying to publish my writing in foreign or international outlets. I would also like to attend and report from more international festivals and keep on learning while doing that.