“In rich countries, 7 out of 10 people make it past their 70th birthday. In poor countries, that percentage drops to 2 out of 10 people. In fact, in the 34 poorest countries in the world, only 6 out of 10 people make it past their 15th birthday.”
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"How Will You Die" by John Poole, NPR
For those who do not believe that the structural violence of poverty exists.
Then everyone start writing your own sci do novels and movie scripts I mean shit it’s just how it turned out it’s not like anyone was trying to be racist
Studios take a couple of massively expensive chances every year on mostly unknown actors or directors—aka giving the Spider-Man franchise to Marc Webb and Andrew Garfield in 2012—but they just don’t take those kinds of chances on people of color. In other words, if Hollywood wanted to make a blockbuster sci-fi/fantasy film starring a woman of color, they definitely could.
[…]
More recently, the Divergent franchise cast Naomi Watts to play a character who was a woman of color in the books. It’s a supporting role for an already established franchise, and for whatever reason the production still couldn’t bring themselves to cast an actor of color.
Question: why do you think we aren’t making “our own” right now?
Question: why do you think you haven’t seen multimillion dollar movies made out of these stories?
Question: why do you think you have to “try” to be racist in order to support racism that already exists?
Answer:
The problem is that white people see racism as conscious hate, when racism is bigger than that. Racism is a complex system of social and political levers and pulleys set up generations ago to continue working on the behalf of whites at other people’s expense, whether whites know/like it or not.
Racism is an insidious cultural disease. It is so insidious that it doesn’t care if you are a white person who likes black people; it’s still going to find a way to infect how you deal with people who don’t look like you. Yes, racism looks like hate, but hate is just one manifestation. Privilege is another. Access is another. Ignorance is another. Apathy is another. And so on.
So while I agree with people who say no one is born racist, it remains a powerful system that we’re immediately born into. It’s like being born into air: you take it in as soon as you breathe. It’s not a cold that you can get over. There is no anti-racist certification class. It’s a set of socioeconomic traps and cultural values that are fired up every time we interact with the world.
It is a thing you have to keep scooping out of the boat of your life to keep from drowning in it. I know it’s hard work, but it’s the price you pay for owning everything.
June 16th, 2014: The teen you give this to doesn't have to be one that lives with you. You can just hand them out on the street, or, say, at next year's E3??
Like. There are a lot of things I could say here. But I’m just going to do my best to answer your question, and the answer is either very simple or very complicated, depending on your current point of view.
1. “They” knew what people with brown skin looked like because people with brown skin had been there literally THE ENTIRE TIME. Some (and father back, ALL) of “them” had brown skin themselves.
2. “People with Brown Skin” and “Europeans” are not separate and mutually exclusive groups.
3. No matter how far back you go, the mythical time that you’re looking for, when all-white, racially and culturally isolated Europe was “real”, will continue to recede from your grasp until it winkles out the like imaginary place it is.
We can just keep going back. In every area, from all walks of life, rich and poor, kings and peasants, artists and iconoclasts, before there were countries and continents, before there were white people.
The time when “EVERYONE” in Europe was White does not exist. They knew what people with brown skin looked like because they were there. They knew what “Africans” looked like because they were there, and they weren’t “they”, they were us, or you. I think what you’re missing is something that never existed.
"Former relationship expert Ryan North takes you on a truth-spittin’, no-holds-barred journey through the frontiers of the genderclash…Finally daring to describe fundamental natural laws that the P.C. police (and Obama-style self-appointed guardians of ‘politeness’) would rather be forgotten!
"Learn about:
• The 12 Rules Of Power Play (Hint: There’s more than 12!)
• What Penguins Do In Private – And Why We Don’t Do The Same (Anymore)
• Five ‘Magic’ Words That Guarantee She’ll Never Forget You, Ever
• The Rule Of Archimedes – In The Bedroom And The Boardroom And The Boardwalk And Park Place, Too…If You Want It, Take It!
• Wandering Womb Syndrome – Ancient Myth Or Mere Superstition? Or Something More?
• Giving Her The ‘Secret Loyalty Test’ – Before She Gives It To You
• Beat Any Paternity Suit! How To Microwave Your DNA – For Good
• Nineteen Spam-Filter-Beating Synonyms For ‘Misandry’ That Have Increasingly Cruel Connotations
• How To Deserve Any Job You Want – From Birth
• ‘I Can’t Be An Asshole If I’m Right’ – Proving This Old Maxim With Ironclad Logic
• The #1 Haircut For Getting Married – And Staying Married, If That’s What You Want
• I’m Sorry, But You Should Never Apologize. And That’s A Canadian Speaking!”
The first thing to know about free tax preparation software is that every legitimate online tax software offers a free version.
If you’re new to tax software, check out my post on the best tax software to see what products rank the highest overall and to learn more about how the software works.
Remember, you can start using online tax software for free and you’ll only be charged if your tax return requires a more complex version.
For anyone with basic tax needs, you can get started right away.
Here’s my list of the 5 best free online tax software for 2014:
What Makes TurboTax the Best Free Online Tax Software?
The #1 reason why TurboTax is the best for free online tax preparation is because the software is simple enough to use for any beginner, yet it produces advanced results. There are step-by-step instructions that walk you through every part of the tax-filing process. The entire time you work through your taxes, your refund amount is displayed in real-time along with your audit risk meter. When you start filing taxes for free online, you can return to specific areas or save your progress at any time. You’ll also have access to free live advice using live chat and expert help with the free version.
TurboTax’s free tax preparation software is useful for filling out simple forms, like the 1040EZ, 1040A, and 1040. You’ll need to upgrade to another version for anything more complex. However, you can always start with the free version and then upgrade as you discover you need a more advanced version.
The Rest of the Best Free Tax Preparation Software
While I rank TurboTax at the top, several products trail right behind. Ultimately, the right choice for you depends on what you value more. While TurboTax might offer the best software and user experience (saving you time), H&R Block allows you to file more forms for free and provides great customer support.
H&R Block Free Edition
Usability and functionality are the key components that place H&R Block slightly behind TurboTax, but I could certainly see an argument for naming H&R Block as the best free online tax software. If you’re making the transition away from your accountant, or if you just want the face-to-face interaction, H&R Block is your top choice.
In addition to the excellent customer service and support, there are other benefits of using H&R Block’s free tax prep software. H&R Block provides you with more than just the basic 1040 income tax form. You can file forms and schedules that are a level above basic for free. You also get free in-person audit support if your return gets flagged for an audit.
TaxACT Free Federal Edition
TaxACT falls into third place on the list of the best free tax software because the product doesn’t offer the same level of advanced tools as TurboTax and H&R Block. However, like the other top products, TaxACT does offer free email support, tax guides, and resources to help you file along the way. You’ll also be able to file basic forms and some complex forms for certain life situations.
The other major benefit of using TaxACT occurs if you find out your tax return requires more than just a simple filing. TaxACT is the cheapest tax software on the market that’s still a high-quality product. With any other tax software, you have to pay up to $37 to file your state taxes, but you can file for as low as $8 with TaxACT.
eSmart Tax
Owned by Liberty Tax, eSmart Tax is an online tax software that continues to make improvements each year. With the free version of the software, you can e-file your federal return for free as with the other products. With eSmart Tax, you’ll also receive free tech support (live chat) and free audit support from one of Liberty Tax’s CPAs.
The tax forms you can file for the free version are very basic. However, eSmart Tax has an extra feature that may interest people who want to try a new product this year. You can import your taxes from a competitor for free. That means you can take your previous year’s return from TurboTax or H&R Block and get started as if you’ve used eSmart Tax in prior years.
TaxSlayer Free Federal Edition
TaxSlayer is the final product that holds a place on the list of the best free tax software simply because of the support features you receive with the free version. You get free email support (just like with the other companies), but you also receive free phone support. The other top products either don’t offer this support to their free users or there is a one-time yearly charge for phone support.
On the downside, TaxSlayer only offers a 1040EZ tax return for free. You won’t be able to file any other forms except the 1040EZ. The free edition also doesn’t come with any tax audit assistance, which is offered for free by the other companies like TurboTax.
State Tax Returns Cost Extra Money
If you have to file a state return, you won’t be able to file your taxes completely for free.
Depending on the software you use, filing your state taxes will cost you anywhere from $8 – $36.99.
The cheapest option for filing your state tax in addition to your free federal return is TaxACT. However, the most efficient option, which costs a little more (between $27.99 and $36.99) is TurboTax because the software is the easiest to use and will likely take you the least amount of time to complete your taxes.
Keep in mind if you live in a state with no income tax, you won’t have to file a state tax return.
Below are the 7 states that don’t have income tax:
Florida
Texas
Washington
Nevada
Alaska
South Dakota
Wyoming
These 2 states have limited state income tax on individuals:
Tennessee
New Hampshire
The rankings on this page only account for the free editions of each tax software. You can check out my post on the best tax software for 2014 to see the full rankings for each product, including in-depth comparisons and analysis.
For those of you who are still considering whether or not to file your taxes online, I recommend reading about why you should file taxes online.
Written by Mike Jelinek
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I have misplaced my race card and I do not know what to do.
It is a little known fact that at birth, all people of color receive a laminated race card,** along with their birth certificate. The race card contains magical properties *** and is something people of color can “play,” to defeat white people in an argument.
The race will often be called into action when white people disagree with you or if they feel threatened. They will exclaim, “Stop playing the race card,” and often do so vaguely leading one to believe that a person of color is “playing the race card,” by merely existing.
People of color can and should disregard all such requests (see the fine print on the back of the race card). People of color must guard their race card with care, as there are no replacements. If you misplace your race card, you will be unable to play it for the rest of your life.
**Also in the set: Feminist Card, Woman Card, Different Ability Card, Queer Card, and more! Collect the whole set, now!
***The race cards of Magical Negros are supersized.
Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria, author of the Katyn massacre. (Wikimedia)
In early 1940, the Soviet Union executed 22,000 Polish officers, intellectuals and others deemed problematic to Soviet rule. The author of this policy was Lavrentiy Beria, chief of the Soviet secret police. Beria was not simply a detached administrator of death, he was a serial rapist who employed the apparatus of the state to his ends:
The records contained the official testimony from Colonel R.S. Sarkisov and Colonel V. Nadaraia, two of Beria's most senior NKVD bodyguards. They stated that on warm nights during the war years, Beria was often driven slowly through the streets of Moscow in his armored Packard limousine. He would point out young women to be detained and escorted to his mansion where wine and a feast awaited them. After dining, Beria would take the women into his soundproofed office and rape them.
Beria's bodyguards reported that their orders included handing each victim a flower bouquet as she left Beria's house. The implication being that to accept made it consensual; refusal would mean arrest. In one incident his chief bodyguard, Sarkisov, reported that a woman who had been brought to Beria rejected his advances and ran out of his office; Sarkisov mistakenly handed her the flowers anyway prompting the enraged Beria to declare "Now it's not a bouquet, it's a wreath! May it rot on your grave!"
The woman was arrested by the NKVD the next day.
One of the men charged with carrying out Beria's orders (and Stalin's will) was Vasili Blokhin, arguably the most prolific executioner in modern history:
He had been one of the main killers during the Great Terror, when he had commanded an execution squad in Moscow. He had been entrusted with some of the executions of high-profile defendants of show trials, but had also shot thousands of workers and peasants who were killed entirely in secret. At Kalinin he wore a leather cap, apron, and long gloves to keep the blood and gore from himself and his uniform. Using German pistols, he shot, each night, about two hundred and fifty men, one after another.
Then the bodies were driven, in a truck, to nearby Mednoe, where the NKVD had some summer houses. They were thrown into a large pit dug earlier by a backhoe.
There are horrific scenes, perpetrated by seemingly awful people, all the way through Bloodlands, so much that a kind of nihilism eventually sets in on the reader. If I have one critique, it's that the sheer scale of death in the book works against one of its ostensible goals--to make us feel the great tragedy that swept through Ukraine, Belorussia and Poland. You move from narrative into something closer to chronicle.
Still I think Snyder frames the questions correctly--How can men commit such acts? The question is not answered by empty invocations of "evil" or vague invocations of "sociopathy." The question is not answered by memorializing victims (though this has its place) or the construction of national oaths (though that too might have its place.) On the contrary the question might best be answered, not by identifying with history greatest victims, but by identifying with its killers. This is in fact, as Snyder argues, the moral position:
It is easy to sanctify policies or identities by the deaths of the victims. It is less appealing, but morally more urgent, to understand the actions of the perpetrators. The moral danger, after all, is never that one might become a victim but that one might be a perpetrator or a bystander.
It is tempting to say that a Nazi murderer is beyond the pale of understanding. Outstanding politicians and intellectuals—for example, Edvard Beneš and Ilya Ehrenburg—yielded to this temptation during the war. The Czechoslovak president and the Soviet-Jewish writer were justifying revenge upon the Germans as such.People who called others subhuman were themselves subhuman. Yet to deny a human being his human character is to render ethics impossible. To yield to this temptation, to find other people to be inhuman, is to take a step toward, not away from, the Nazi position. To find other people incomprehensible is to abandon the search for understanding, and thus to abandon history. To dismiss the Nazis or the Soviets as beyond human concern or historical understanding is to fall into their moral trap. The safer route is to realize that their motives for mass killing, however revolting to us, made sense to them.
Vasili Blokhin was a particular man, handpicked for a particular duty. Even the SS was purged in the last phase of the Final Solution, so that it could reduced to its most willing killers. But the point is not that all humans are interchangeable, so much as it is that game must recognize game. Most of us may not be killers, but there is a killer in most of us. Much as there is a slaveholder in most of us. It is enough to understand that mass murder made sense to Himmler. You have to get to the Himmler within.
I think that allows for a skeptical morality. I think that allows those of us on the socio-economic bottom to give up our righteousness, to understand that there is nothing super-moral, or blessed, or prophesied in being down here. The bottom is just the bottom. Can we truly say we'd be much different were we on top?
Perhaps we can--but not because of what is in our bones, but because of what is behind our questions. Once we can see the world from Stalin's end, perhaps we can push further and question, not just tactics, but goals. Perhaps we can see that the means by which we seek liberation--for ourselves and others--can not truly be separated from the ends:
It cannot be denied that mass starvation brings political stability of a certain kind. The question must be: is that the sort of peace that is desired, or that should be desired? Mass murder does bind perpetrators to those who give them orders. Is that the right sort of political allegiance? Terror does consolidate a certain kind of regime. Is that kind of regime preferable? Killing civilians is in the interest of certain kinds of leaders. The question is not whether all this is historically true; the question is what is desirable. Are these leaders good leaders, and these regimes good regimes? If not, the question is: how can such policies be prevented?
The website io9 had a post today about Japanese demons and I decided to draw some of ‘em. These are Kamaitachi, a trio of weasels that go around cutting off people’s legs with a sickle and then sewing up the stumps.
Brooklyn is the East Coast epicenter of the “artisanal” food store trend, a movement that takes regular, dull food and spices it up with delicious elitism. The latest establishment to advance the forefront of snooty eating, according to a report from Eater, is an artisanal porridge shop in Brooklyn. New Yorkers can now enjoy the upscale gruel they never knew they craved. Perhaps they fancy the “Fruit & Cream” number with local Brooklyn Culture low-fat Greek yogurt, or the gluten-free, dairy-free, non-GMO savory “Truffled Heart” with artichoke hearts and white truffle oil. Add an agave drizzle for an extra quarter!
These are all actual menu items at Brooklyn Porridge Co., even if they seem like jokes. Unwitting self-parody is an essential part of the Brooklyn artisanal experience. If you’re unfamiliar with the artisanal food business, I’ve outlined a few simple steps to show you how it works. So start ...
The time has come to weep boozy, psychedelic tears, for the rumored collaborative LP from The Flaming Lips and Ke$ha is no more. Lips frontman Wayne Coyne said earlier this year that Lip$ha would see the light of day in the near future, noting that the two entities loved working together, and had a “blast on all levels.” Unfortunately, that blast has since become an implosion, with Coyne tweeting today that “there will be no Lip$ha,” though he “can’t say why.”
Stereogum is positing that the dissolution of the partnership is less due to love lost ...
Eastbound & Down comes to a close on HBO this Sunday, bringing an end to the rambunctious odyssey of Kenny Powers. Ke$ha, for one, is apparently such a huge fan of the “all-American hillbilly white-trash hero"—with whom she feels a kind of kinship—she penned a tribute to the character forRolling Stone to express her sorrow at losing him:
When my music first came out, my sense of humor was kind of lost in translation. I was like, "Man, they don't know I'm in on the joke!" But then I saw Eastbound & Down, and I knew ...
Bob Neill’s Book of Typewriter Art (1982), via Lori Emerson. With a computer programme to enable some of the pictures to be produced on a home computer (such as the Commodore PET) using the BASIC computer language.
"One would need to return to the Dark Ages or the depredations of Genghis Khan to find a war as devastating. By point of comparison, over the previous century, during which it had expanded its empire to five continents, the British Empire had been involved in some forty different conflicts around the globe--colonial insurrections mostly, but including the Crimean and Boer wars--and had lost some forty thousand soldiers in the process.
"Over the next four years, it would lose over twenty times that number.
"In the disastrous Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, France had suffered an estimated 270,000 battlefield casualties; in the present war, it was to surpass that number in the first three weeks. In this conflict, Germany would see 13 percent of it's military-age male population killed, Serbia 15 percent of its total population, while in just a two-year span, 1913-1915, the life expectancy of a French male would drop from fifty years to twenty-seven.
"So inured would the architects of the carnage become to such statistics that at the launch of his 1916 Somme offensive, British general Douglas Haig could look over the first day's casualty rolls--with fifty-eight thousand Allied soldiers dead or wounded--it remains the bloodiest single day in the history of the English-speaking world--and judge that the numbers "cannot be considered severe."
"The effect of all this on the collective European psyche would be utterly profound. Initial euphoria would give way to shock, shock to horror, and then, as the killing dragged on with no end in sight, horror to a kind of benumbed despair.
"In the process, though, the European public would come to question some of the most basic assumptions about their societies. Among the things they would realize was that, stripped of all its high-minded justifications and rhetoric, at its core this war had many of the trappings of an extended family feud, a chance for Europe's kings and emperors--many of them related by blood--to act out old grievance and personal slights atop the heaped bodies of their loyal subjects.
"In turn, Europe's imperial structure had fostered a culture of decrepit military elites--aristocrats and aging war heroes and palace sycophants--whose sheer incompetence on the battlefield, as well as callousness toward those dying for them, was matched only by that of their rivals.
"Indeed, in looking at the conduct of the war and the almost preternatural idiocy displayed by all the powers, perhaps its most remarkable feature is that anyone finally won at all."
Although Breaking Bad lives on inside all of us—all of us being articles on pop culture websites—more tangibly, it will live on in AMC’s planned spinoff, Better Call Saul. And while we already know the show will be a prequel, concerning Saul Goodman’s life before he got mixed up with Walter White, we also now know that certainly doesn’t preclude Walt—or any of the other characters from the Breaking Bad universe—from making an appearance.
Gilligan says as much in this new Hollywood Reporter profile, in which he discusses how, despite Saul’s lighter ...
If Donald Glover is sad, we should try to comfort him.
On Monday, Donald Glover shared some of his emotions (his emotions) with the world through a series of Instagrams, in which he posted several confessional notes he’d written on hotel stationery. And while the tone seemed rather bleak and desperate at times—leaving some to wonder whether his whole brain was crying, ha ha, but no seriously, are you okay, Donald Glover?—Glover has followed up by insisting that really, he’s fine. In a follow-up with People, he explains, “That night, we had a show, and then afterwards, I had this moment of feeling like, 'What's ...
In the worst example yet of The Daily Show’s “gotcha” tactics of using working cameras and microphones, North Carolina’s Don Yelton, a GOP county precinct chair, was caught making racist comments that were then recorded and broadcast on television, where others could hear them. And now The Daily Show’s devious strategy of letting its interviewees talk has cost Yelton his job: According to a statement given to Business Insider by spokesman Nathan West, the Buncombe County Republican Party asked for Yelton’s resignation “in direct response” to the interview that aired Wednesday night, wherein Aasif Mandvi questioned ...
