but re: portland's first bone broth restaurant, Salt, Fire & Time:
"I just had lunch at a new place that only serves BONE BROTH, AKA STOCK. (And they don't even season it or add herbs.) Five dollars for about 10 ounces, plus oodles more if you want add-ons like 'medicinal mushroom' or 'chicken hearts.' I have a sodium headache because seasoning it means the salt just settles at the bottom and makes it undrinkable. HULK SMASH AND NEVER GO BACK. Fucking bogus food trends make me so angry. This and juice cleanses can go eat a giant bag of pasture-raised dicks."
I hated bone broth from the day I read about its woo-woo claims that simmering bones from grass-fed animals for 72 hours with a bit of apple cider vinegar to "extract nutrients" makes it healthier than grandma's stock. Still, I was prepared to go to Salt, Fire & Time and say it was very tasty stock—if only that were the case. Unfortunately, it arrives as an oil slick of bland liquid. Want some for home? How does $18 for 32 ounces sound?
Fellow Merc contributor, food historian, and fantastic home cook Heather Arndt Anderson joined me, and said: "The odd thing is the stock tastes like they didn't use two of the three ingredients in their name"—there was no salt involved and it didn't taste like they roasted their bones before simmering. She concluded: "People should just stick with pho and ramen." Yuuup.
She’s one of the most successful players in tennis history, so it should come as no surprise that people are really looking forward to watching Serena Williams pursuit of the Grand Slam—winning all four major tennis competitions (the Australian, French and US Opens, and Wimbledon) in one season.
The US Open final, scheduled for Sept. 12, could see Williams competing for what would be her 22nd major title, which would bring her level with Germany’s Steffi Graf, and only second behind Australian Margaret Court, who won 24 majors.
But whether or not Williams wins, she has already made history: the excitement for the match is so high that, for what’s believed to be the first time in history, tickets for the women’s singles final sold out before the men’s, according to ESPN. A tournament official told ESPN that some seats for the day are trading at around three times their typical value, and ticket resellers report one of the smallest gaps ever seen between the average prices for the men’s and women’s finals.
As Quartz has reported before, professional tennis is the only sport where women are paid anything close to men at the highest levels. Grand Slam tournaments award equal prize money to both genders, unlike most of the showpiece competitions in other sports. That builds interest and popularity in the women’s game to rival the men’s during major competitions—and then some.
'Flanagan, who reported on-air under the name Bryce Williams, purchased the Glock 9 mm pistol in July from a federally licensed gun dealer in Virginia.
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives spokesman Tom Faison told The Roanoke Times on Thursday that Flanagan said a background check was conducted on Flanagan before the purchase was finalized. The check didn’t reveal any of the criteria that would have prevented him from owning a gun, such as felony conviction or a history of court-ordered psychiatric treatment, the newspaper reported.
Faison said Flanagan purchased multiple guns but didn’t say how many guns he purchased. It’s unclear whether the gun Flanagan used to shoot himself was the same one used to kill WDBJ reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward and wound Smith Mountain Lake Chamber of Commerce leader Vicki Gardner. The Roanoke Times reports at least one of the guns was the same make and model as the one Virginia Tech school shooter Seung-Hui Cho used to murder 32 students in 2007 before killing himself, Faison said.
“He could be as mentally ill as the day is long,” Faison said, “but unless someone has been legally adjudicated as such, they can purchase a firearm.”
Flanagan, 41, was ordered by his bosses at the WDBJ station to seek help for his frequent problems with co-workers, according to a July 30, 2012 memo obtained by The Guardian.'
Palmyra is rapidly becoming the symbol of Isis’s cultural iconoclasm.
If Isis is permitted to wipe the slate clean and rewrite the history of a region that defined global aesthetic and political sensibilities, we will collectively suffer a costly and irreversible defeat.
But there is hope. By placing the record of our past in the digital realm, it will lie for ever beyond the reach of vandals and terrorists.
In collaboration with UNESCO World Heritage and the epigraphical database project at NYU’s Institute for the Study of the Ancient World and engineering specialists at Oxford University, we hope to capture one million 3D images of at-risk objects by the end of 2016. To that end, we have created a heavily modified version of an inexpensive consumer 3D camera that will permit inexperienced users to capture archival-quality scans. The camera has the facility to upload these images automatically to database servers where they can be used for study or, if required, 3D replication. It is our intention to deploy up to five-thousand of these low-cost 3D cameras in conflict zones throughout the world by the end of 2015.
When Francesca Pardi sent Pope Francis her children’s book, Why do you have two moms? she probably wasn’t expecting a response.
In her letter, sent on June 19, Pardi expresses respect for Catholics and says many have treated her well, but also says that representatives of the church have been disrespectful to her same-sex partnership and family, and she asks the Pope to check this behavior (translated from Italian):
Several Catholic organizations have lowered themselves to unworthy behaviors, deliberately deforming reality, the very ones who are meant to demonstrate a superior moral fiber: I would really like for you to stop them.
Pardi also sent the Pope a package of children’s books about untraditional families from her publishing house, Lo Stampatello (link in Italian). Why do you have two moms?, as well as two of Pardi’s other books, have been banned from Venice’s Kindergarten libraries.
But the pontiff did reply, sending a friendly though cautious letter postmarked July 10, via Monsignor Peter Brian Wells.
On her Facebook page, Pardi posted a picture of the envelope addressed to her by the Holy See. She did not post the Pope’s letter itself, but she summarized it (translated here from Italian):
He thanks me for the kind gesture and for the sentiment that motivated it, and hopes for an always more fruitful activity at the service of young generations and sharing authentic human and christian values.
The Pope closes the letter with his “apostle’s blessing” (a special benediction), for Pardi, she said, “together with Ms Maria Silvia Fiengo”—her same-sex partner and the other mother of her four children.
Pardi and others in Italy’s LGBTQ community in Italy took the Pope’s message as a sign of acceptance: In particular, his saying her work is “at the service of young generations” and the fact that he imparted a blessing upon her and her same-sex partner.
@jonibisoni ho detto solo che il messaggio del Papa mostra la capacità di dialogare con rispetto anche con la pensa diversamente
(Translated: I only said that the Pope’s message shows capacity of respectful dialogue with those with different way of thinking.)
The Vatican did not deny Pardi’s account of the Pope’s letter—but it made a point to throw cold water on the idea that the leader of the Catholic church was offering encouragement or an accepting message about LGBTQ lifestyles.
Father Ciro Benedettini, the Vatican spokesperson, published a note (link in Italian) asserting that in no way is the letter “meant to endorse behaviors and teachings unfit to the Gospel.” Benedettini also says that the Pope’s blessing was meant for the individual, and was “not in line with the church’s doctrine on gender theory, which has not changed in the slightest.”
Quartz has reached out to both Pardi and the Holy See for comments on the exchange and will update this post with any response.
While the church’s official position is that homosexual acts are a sin, the current Pope has at times hinted at a more tolerant view that have led many to hope for a change in stance—including by famously saying, in 2013, “If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?”
Italy remains a relatively inhospitable place for LGBTQ people. It is one of the few countries in Europe that doesn’t allow any form of same-sex unions, and the Italian government (link in Italian) has gotten an ultimatum from the European court of human rights to work on a law that allowed gay unions.
Many publicly still express hostility towards LGBTQ rights, and among them is the mayor of Venice, Luigi Brugnaro, whose first act in office was banning several children’s books from the city’s Kindergarten libraries, including Pardi’s Little Egg, What’s dad’s secret, and Why do I have two moms?
Several groups, mostly Catholic, have attacked the authors of the books, which media have dismissively called “gay fairytales,” claiming they try to “indoctrinate” kids to prefer gay unions.
But that was never the intention, Pardi said in her letter to the Pope.
“Maria Silvia and I opened the publishing house for the love of our kids,” she wrote. “The book Why do you have two moms? is simply our (their) story.”
“It’s not ideology,” she explained, “but love for a neighbor.”
New projects are integrating traditional art with digital innovation, and the medium's proponents believe it can tell stories in a way other media may not.
Google has a set a date of September 1 for when its Chrome browser will block all Flash content that isn't "central to the webpage." Flash content, such as ads or auto-playing videos on non-video websites, will be automatically paused by default—but you can click to play them if you wish. Embedded video players on sites like YouTube and Vimeo will still work, of course.
The Flash-blocking feature was initially rolled out to a beta version of Chrome earlier this year. At the time, Google's Tommi Li claimed that the reason for the blocking was battery life, thanks to auto-playing Flash ads consuming a large amount of CPU time.
The move could also help stop the spread of malware via malicious Flash ads. Flash has had a long history of security exploits, with the most recent exploit being uncovered in July, which potentially allowed hackers to remotely execute malicious code.
Friday marks the 10-year anniversary of when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, and many commentators have argued that not enough has been done over the past decade to address infrastructure and emergency response issues that could put coastal cities nationwide, including New Orleans, at risk of a catastrophe on a similar scale. Here’s how experts recommend we prepare for the next Katrina:
Cities can adequately prepare residents for life after a natural disaster by razing low-income neighborhoods beforehand
Every household should have an emergency storm preparedness kit that includes an extra five stories of elevation
Learning from the humiliation of Katrina, FEMA has stockpiled almost 10,000 body bags to avoid any potential shortages
Every family should designate a fixed point to gather to watch disaster footage on TV
Citizens nationwide can prepare for disasters by having a stash of sympathetic Facebook posts and tweets ready to go
New York City has quietly shuttered its busiest STD clinic, and the city has cut hundreds of thousands of free HIV tests since 2010. City officials blame a shrinking budget, but AIDS activists say it’s putting many people at risk.
Tor.com is launching a whole new series of e-book novellas, and this one is especially notable because it brings the author of Who Fears Death into space opera. Binti is the first of the Hinta people to be offered a place at Oozma University, “the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy.”
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The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood (Nan A. Talese)
Another dystopian future from the author of The Handmaid’s Tale and the Oryx and Crake books. Everything has fallen apart, and a married couple is forced to live in their car—until they get a great offer. They can spend every other month living in a nice cottage, with decent jobs, as long as they spend the off months in a hellish prison. What is the secret of the Positron Project?
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Ancillary Mercy by Ann Leckie (Orbit)
Here’s the third book in the Imperial Radch trilogy. Breq, the soldier who used to be a warship, finds someone who shouldn’t exist and faces a head-on challenge from her arch-enemy Anaander Mianaai, who destroyed the ship Justice of Toren. Her back is against the wall, and the odds are against her. Kirkus says this is a worthy conclusion to the saga.
Your “to read” pile is about to get much more massive. This fall’s science fiction and fantasy books include new titles by legends like Margaret Atwood, Salman Rushdie, Stephen King, Jim Butcher and Tanya Huff. You’re not ready for this! Which is why we’re getting you ready, with our guide to fall books.
[Trigger Warning: Discussion of internet harassment. Most of the offending material is behind links, but there are transphobic remarks and racial slurs below. Be warned.]
They haven’t yet released a single episode. All that exists of Gen Zed online is a 2 minute trailer. Yet, as we learned during Anita Sarkeesian’s harrowing ordeal after simply announcing the possibility of her Tropes Vs. Women in Video Games series, all that needs to exist is a desire to make the pop culture landscape more diverse for the truly hateful to come out of the woodwork.
The lovely (/sarcasm) people at 4Chan and 8Chan (among other offshoots) have decided to make Gen Zed their next target for harassment, because it made the mistake of having a trans female protagonist (who’s played by a trans woman who happens to also be Jewish and a lesbian), along with a black character, an Asian character, and a white character that isn’t completely perfect. What’s more, the series is written by an English Jew! I know, horrible right?
It all began on Sunday night, when Gen Zed‘s YouTube channel was suddenly flooded with negative comments. Show creator Hayden Black recalls that, “I was definitely thrown those first few hours as I’d never seen this type of hatred before and my knee-jerk reaction was to delete virtually every comment. Since then, we’ve seen a lot of this show’s shit trolling which doesn’t bother me at all. But I’m wondering if it’s so lame, why are you telling us this thousands of times a day? What are you so afraid of?”
Congratufuckinglations.
It wasn’t just YouTube comments they were receiving. They began to receive all sorts of horribleness via Twitter, Facebook, and beyond. Like the charming photo above, for starters. There was nothing about this show (correction, this TRAILER – remember this is all based on a two minute video) that these channers didn’t have something to spew vitriol over.
There’s the trans woman angle: here, here, and here. Then, they decided to hate the fact that the show’s lead actress is trans and Jewish: here, and here. Then, they went after the other characters on the show in really bizarre distortions of logic like this, or this. There was plenty more that Black sent us that we’re not going to share here, but you get the idea. It was a lot, and they’re still getting it today. There’s even an entry on good ol’ Encyclopedia Douchebag Dramatica.
Even worse, you may have noticed that the video for the trailer in our original post about Gen Zed is no longer available (and this is after the video had approached 100,000 views). Guess why?
Yup. Channers joined forces to flag the Gen Zed YouTube channel so that YouTube would ban them. The team over at Gen Zed is currently working it out with YouTube, and hopefully the channel will be up again soon. But no matter what, no creator should have to deal with this level of abuse. What’s interesting is that we’re used to women bearing the brunt of the harassment alone. In this case, all of the hatespeech is coming through to a cisgender, heterosexual male creator who was trying to give other voices a platform.
I had the chance to speak with Black, as well as the show’s star, Julie Rei Goldstein (who does the voice of Shona Sommers), about how they’re dealing with this experience, and they seem to be taking it in stride, despite the obvious horribleness of it.
Teresa Jusino (TMS): How did you first become aware of what was going on?
Julie Rei Goldstein: I’d just gotten home from dinner with some of my family for my birthday when Hayden called me.
TMS: How does this kind of harassment make you feel and impact your life?
Hayden Black: The ultra-racist/bigoted stuff aside – which has been about 30% of the comments – I’m amazed that people are so obsessed with Gen Zed. I mean, this is a two minute trailer and people aren’t just feeling the need to kick it via the comments sections. They’re creating artwork and videos to kick it! One of them is an 18 minute rant. That’s 9 times longer than the trailer! How many other 2 minute promos can rally this sort of response?
Goldstein: It just makes me feel sad that people are still holding on to all this hatred and prejudice in 2015. I don’t read everything because I’m just too busy. I don’t really feel like I need to protect myself because I’ve been through the ringer for over a decade and it takes a lot to get to me nowadays. Maybe 10 years ago I might have buckled under the hatred, but that’s just not me anymore. I’m much stronger than that. My main concern is always those around me. I don’t want to see anyone hurt because of vitriol that’s directed towards me. Furthermore my bigger concern in the Trans community has never been about myself, but those who aren’t as strong as I am emotionally. Some in our community tend to dismiss discussions about slurs, hate speech and so-called word policing as trivial, something we should all just get stronger and overcome, but with the astronomical depression and suicide attempt rate in our community, I just can’t accept “being strong enough” as the barrier for survival.
Black: I see the the stuff on YouTube as I delete it. I’ve stayed away from certain message boards but friends have been reading them and sending me (unsolicited) updates. Some people there are convinced we’re writing those posts ourselves; some are amazed that the Twitter account (of a fictional animated character) is written by a real live human being; etc etc. If only we could harness that power for something other than bashing a 2 minute cartoon.
I do wonder how individual people take their shit – because I’ve heard horror stories from other people, other minorities, about how it felt the day these kinda people turned to focus their ire on them. Julie has been taking it in stride; her strength is such an inspiration.
At the end of the day, I’m creating a comedy about four college-age kids, one of whom is Trans, one of whom is African-American, one of whom is Asian-American, and one of whom is Caucasian. This is scary? If you don’t like the subject matter, the comedy itself or the animation, don’t watch it. But the fact that thousands of people are going out of their way to punch and kick us means it’s already a lot more than that.
TMS: How do you think this will affect Gen Zed’s progress, if at all?
Black: It will help us grow our audience because along with the nastier comments, we’ve gotten loads more people adding us on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and Instagram. And it gives the haters something to bond over.
Goldstein: It fuels us to keep moving forward. All they’ve really given us is proof of why we what we’re creating is necessary and important. Many of their vile comments were denigrating Trans people who aren’t even involved in Gen Zed, bringing up the same bigoted arguments you hear from anti-LGBT organizations who want to legally deny us access to healthcare, public accommodations and employment.
TMS: Being a cisgender heterosexual dude, had you ever experienced this level of vitriol on any of your other projects? Were you surprised by the level of negativity that came with simply creating a trans female lead?
Black: Nothing like this at all – well, my mother has said some nasty things but what can you do. And yes, I’m surprised; surprised that so many people are scared by a positive portrayal of a Trans woman.
TMS: What’s the status of the YouTube situation as of right now?
Black: We’re talking to YouTube to have it reinstated. One of the trolls reposted the Gen Zed promo on his YouTube channel after the official one was taken down this morning. And another troll posted on Twitter that now it’s taken down he can’t keep making fun of us. So no matter what else they say, they clearly can’t get enough of us!
TMS: What would you say to the trolls if you could?
Black: There’s so many more interesting things to do on the internet – like watching porn.
Goldstein: If you think you have a valuable creative contribution, by all means follow your passion. What they’re doing is cowardly, but creating takes courage.
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It astounds me that a site like 4Chan or 8Chan or any other chan can exist out in the open, be so clearly devoted to being a base for hatred, and be allowed to exist. Yes, individuals and private companies/organizations have the right to free speech, but when a site is used to organize attacks on people (doxxing, stalking, etc) that put them in danger, that’s no longer free speech. That’s committing a crime against others.
Meanwhile, the fact that Gen Zed has already become such a target and that the channers find it so threatening to their “way of life” due to its portrayal of a diverse cast means that it’s exactly the kind of thing we should try to encourage and see more of. If you’d like to keep up while their YouTube channel is down, you can check out Gen Zed‘s Twitter, their Tumblr, their Facebook page, and their website.
UPDATE: As of Saturday, August 29 at 5 p.m. ET, Gen Zed‘s YouTube account has been reinstated. Check out the trailer and more here.
Lee Daniels’ long-in-the-works biopic of comedian Richard Pryor seems like it’s finally ready to get underway, with The Weinstein Company indicating that it’s about to give the film the green light, and the movie’s long-contested casting finally confirmed. As announced more than a year ago, Survivor’s Remorsestar and stand-up comic Mike Epps will play the iconic comedian, who rose from an abusive childhood to international fame and success (also drug-addiction, self-destructive behavior, and numerous contentious relationships with women, but we’ll let Daniels handle those uglier details in due course).
Epps will be joined by some impressive names, including Eddie Murphy, who was once a candidate for the role of Pryor himself, several version of this project ago. Murphy will play the comedian’s father, LeRoy “Buck Carter” Pryor, a role he’s been rumored to be circling for several months. (This, despite occasional protests ...
'Though it's obviously not the right behavior for a self-driving car, that's not a bad outcome for the encounter. Drivers often aren't very courteous of cyclists, but a well-made autonomous vehicle would have no option but to be careful and respectful. "The odd thing," the cyclist writes, is that "I felt safer dealing with a self-driving car than a human-operated one." Google may still have a lot of work to do, but that's the outcome it's looking for.'
Google's self-driving cars are cautious by design, but in at least one instance, it may be a bit too much. A cyclist posting on a road bike forum says that an encounter between themself and a self-driving car ended up with neither moving more than a few inches for a good two minutes. The cyclist apparently came to a stop at a four-way intersection moments after a Google car did, but the cyclist remained standing on their bike. As the car began to move forward, the cyclist also rolled forward slightly, causing the car to come to a halt. While trying to maintain balance on the bike, this back and forth keep going:
"I felt safer dealing with a self-driving car than a human-operated one."
"We repeated this little dance for about two full minutes, and the car never made it past the middle of the intersection," the cyclist writes. "The two guys inside were laughing and punching stuff into a laptop, I guess trying to modify some code to 'teach' the car something about how to deal with the situation."
Though it's obviously not the right behavior for a self-driving car, that's not a bad outcome for the encounter. Drivers often aren't very courteous of cyclists, but a well-made autonomous vehicle would have no option but to be careful and respectful. "The odd thing," the cyclist writes, is that "I felt safer dealing with a self-driving car than a human-operated one." Google may still have a lot of work to do, but that's the outcome it's looking for.
The encounter is said to have occurred in Austin, where Google very recently began a new set of self-driving car tests on public roads. In fact, it's encounters like this one that Google was looking for when it started up there. "From pedicabs to pickup trucks, Austin's streets will give our self-driving car some new learning experiences," Google said at the time. It's not surprising to hear that Google's cars continue to be cautious in their encounters with basically anything else on the road. Google recently started to report accidents that its cars have been in, and so far, Google says, every accident was the fault of another vehicle's human driver.
![Palmyra is rapidly becoming the symbol of Isis’s cultural iconoclasm.If Isis is permitted to wipe the slate clean and rewrite the history of a region that defined global aesthetic and political sensibilities, we will collectively suffer a costly and irreversible defeat.But there is hope. By placing the record of our past in the digital realm, it will lie for ever beyond the reach of vandals and terrorists.– ROGER MICHEL, IDA DIRECTORScientists launch hi-tech plan to save ancient Middle East relics from Islamic StateIn collaboration with UNESCO World Heritage and the epigraphical database project at NYU’s Institute for the Study of the Ancient World and engineering specialists at Oxford University, we hope to capture one million 3D images of at-risk objects by the end of 2016. To that end, we have created a heavily modified version of an inexpensive consumer 3D camera that will permit inexperienced users to capture archival-quality scans. The camera has the facility to upload these images automatically to database servers where they can be used for study or, if required, 3D replication. It is our intention to deploy up to five-thousand of these low-cost 3D cameras in conflict zones throughout the world by the end of 2015.The Million Image Database Project - Institute of Digital ArchaeologyMore on Digital Archeology: Indiana Joneses run hi-tech race against Islamic State - BBC[Image is a LIDAR scan of Angkor Wat, Cambodia, via Discover Magazine]](http://36.media.tumblr.com/0f5b6aaa15f549547e8f2f2cf478ff71/tumblr_ntsefmbqc71qjjis9o1_500.jpg)
![Palmyra is rapidly becoming the symbol of Isis’s cultural iconoclasm.If Isis is permitted to wipe the slate clean and rewrite the history of a region that defined global aesthetic and political sensibilities, we will collectively suffer a costly and irreversible defeat.But there is hope. By placing the record of our past in the digital realm, it will lie for ever beyond the reach of vandals and terrorists.– ROGER MICHEL, IDA DIRECTORScientists launch hi-tech plan to save ancient Middle East relics from Islamic StateIn collaboration with UNESCO World Heritage and the epigraphical database project at NYU’s Institute for the Study of the Ancient World and engineering specialists at Oxford University, we hope to capture one million 3D images of at-risk objects by the end of 2016. To that end, we have created a heavily modified version of an inexpensive consumer 3D camera that will permit inexperienced users to capture archival-quality scans. The camera has the facility to upload these images automatically to database servers where they can be used for study or, if required, 3D replication. It is our intention to deploy up to five-thousand of these low-cost 3D cameras in conflict zones throughout the world by the end of 2015.The Million Image Database Project - Institute of Digital ArchaeologyMore on Digital Archeology: Indiana Joneses run hi-tech race against Islamic State - BBC[Image is a LIDAR scan of Angkor Wat, Cambodia, via Discover Magazine]](http://41.media.tumblr.com/0f5b6aaa15f549547e8f2f2cf478ff71/tumblr_ntsefmbqc71qjjis9o1_1280.jpg)
Super Opinionated.
