Minister Faust's Blog, page 3

IMPROVISER + SKETCH COMIC RON PEDERSON ON JOINING + LEAVING MADTV (MF GALAXY 153)

WHY ACTING ONSTAGE IS SO MUCH MORE SATISFYING THAN ACTING ONSCREEN, WHAT HE LOVED ABOUT WORKING ON MADTV + WHY HE LEFT IT FOREVER
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Ron Pederson. I never worked with him but we crossed paths a bunch of times in Edmonton’s sketch comedy, improv, and theatre community, and then one day I up and turn on my TV and boom! There he is on MadTV, which for me was the funniest US sketch show ever made.

I shouldn’t’ve been so surprised he’d hit the big time. Other Edmontonians had made it big, including Michael J. Fox,
Still, to see a kid I knew on MadTV was exciting, and Ron was great. Plus I’d seen him kill in the gonzo science fiction musical comedy Road to Uranus by Dana Anderson and Cathleen Rootsaert. And he’d been a mainstay in the longform improv community with shows such as Die-Nasty!, and worked all across Canada with major outfits such as the Citadel in Edmonton, the Stratford Festival, the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre, Tarragon, and more. So why not MadTV, huh?

But after three seasons, Ron left MadTV, and for plenty of people, by which I mean me, that raised the question, “What the hell? After you get on a show like freaking MadTV, why would you ever leave?”

Well, I decided to ask him.

In today’s MF GALAXY, Ron Pederson discusses:

How he started in the Edmonton theatre and improv communities, and which local luminary gave him his life-altering first big breakHow improv is invaluable for performing artists and for plain-old being aliveThe gonzo experiment of performing in an improv competition between two teams… completely by himself as both teams and the judgeWhy acting onstage is so much more satisfying than acting onscreen, andWhat he loved about working on what he calls one of the greatest sketch shows ever produced, and why he left it forever
We spoke by Skype on November 11, 2014.

To hear the nearly half an hour of patrons-only bonus content from my conversation with Ron Pederson, visit mfgalaxy.org to click on the Patreon link to become a sponsor for a dollar or more per week.

By funding MF GALAXY, you get access to all extended editions of the show including this one with Ron Pederson discussing:

His performance at the Edmonton International Fringe Festival of the science fiction musical comedy Road to Uranus with writers Cathleen Rootsaert and Dana AndersonThe mindset required to earn a living as a stage actorHow he got cast the audition for MadTV and how he nailed itWhat it takes to survive and thrive on a sketch comedy TV series, and the surprising reason why he left it all behind
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Want to be famous? Want to share your love or rage about anything you’ve heard on the show, or your analysis of a related topic?

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It’s easy! Just grab your phone or other recording device and say what you’ve got to say.

Make sure you begin by saying, “I'm (your name). I (describe yourself). I want to talk about (your topic) because....”

Don't read a script. Using notes is just fine. Sounding unrehearsed is key. Rambling is just fine! Go as “inside baseball” as you like. Anything under 3 minutes is great.

The technical details:

Record your answers into your phone or other device as a decent mp3 (preferably 192 kbps or higher at a sample rate of 44100 Hz—but if you don't know what that means, don't worry about it) and send it to me by email or Dropbox using mfgalaxypodcast [at] gmail [dot] com.

WOMEN REACT TO STAR WARS THE LAST JEDI (MF GALAXY 152)

SYLVIA DOUGLAS (LADY GEEKS UNITE), S.G. WONG (DIE ON YOUR FEET: A LOLA STARKE NOVEL), AND LISA YASZEK (SISTERS OF TOMORROW) DISCUSS HOW THE LAST JEDI ANSWERS THE QUESTION, "WHAT HAPPENS WHEN MEN DON'T LISTEN TO WOMEN?"

Listen/download  Star Wars, The Last Jedi has got people talking about its exciting characters and battles and how iconic characters achieve their glory or meet their end. And for the first time there are plenty of female speaking roles in a Star Wars film: Rey, Rose and Paige Tico, Vice Admiral Holdo, Maz Kanata, Captain Phasma, and of course Princess Leia.
Some people claim, though, that reactions to the film are split along gender lines—that men hate it and women love it, because it’s the first Star Wars film to ask and answer the question, “What happens when men don’t listen to women?”
Well, obviously there are women who hate the film and men who love it (me included), but rather than argue about love-hate gender percentages that no one has actually measured, why not just ask some remarkable women what they thought about the female characters, their personalities and deeds, and whether the film does them justice?
So I did. On today’s MF GALAXY you’ll hear from Lisa Yaszek, science fiction scholar at Georgia Tech; Sylvia Douglas, a lead organiser of Lady Geeks Unite in Edmonton, and SG Wong, speculative crime novelist and community organiser, also from Edmonton.
Together, they’ll cover:Who the most-short-changed character since Boba Fett isWhat it means to say that Star Wars suffers from the “Highlander Syndrome”What fashion has always revealed about the morality of Star Wars characters, and what it means to themAnd the disturbing significance in the age of Trump of who excuses lethal mutiny, and why, and who has already paid the price
Sylvia Douglas + Lady Geeks Unitetwitter.com/lgnyeg Lady Geeks of #YEG – How feminist fans empower women + girls + upgrade fandom
SG Wongsgwong.comSG Wong on world building + going indie when publisher does nothingCooking the Books: NaloHopkinson, Ekaterina Sedia + SG Wong on food, cyborgs+feminism
Lisa Yazekpwp.gatech.edu/lyaszek (copy and paste this link into your browser)Lisa Yaszek and Patrick Sharp on Sisters of Tomorrow: The true story of SF women pioneers + the men who fought them
Hey, MF GALAXY crew! Why not add your voice to the MF GALAXY podcast and the MF GALAXY blog?
That’s what Jeff Quest did when I asked for opinions on the women of Star Wars, the Last Jedi. Jeff Quest is the blogger at SpyWrite.com and spybrary.com. In the following, he talks about how Rey is not only the newLuke Skywalker—she’s actually the betterone. Listen here.

Jeff Quest spywrite.com spybrary.com/tag/jeff-quest
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STAR WARS, THE LAST JEDI – THE REVIEW BY STEPHEN NOTLEY, FISH GRIWKOWSKY + MINISTER FAUST (MF GALAXY 151)

LISTEN/DOWNLOAD I don’t need much of an intro to today’s topic. We’re talking Star Wars: Episode Eight – The Last Jedi. JJ Abrams and his writer-flunkies are out for this one, but they’ll be back for number nine. This time the writer-director is Rian Johnson. Or is it Reean? Or Ree-Anne? Who knows. He’s done acclaimed work including Brick, The Brothers Bloom, Looper, and three episodes of Breaking Bad including its third last episode “Ozymandias.” In other words, buddy knows a thing or two about storytelling. But how well can he do Star Wars? To help answer that question I’m joined today by two old friends: Stephen Notley, video game designer and the creator of Bob the Angry Flower, and Fish Griwkowsky, arts journalist and filmmaker. We’re all lifelong fans of Star Wars and we met three days after the opening of the film, December 17, 2017 at Edmonton’s Route 99 Diner to hash out The Last Jedi. And yes, today’s discussion is 100% SPOILERS. Listen at your own risk. In today’s episode of MF GALAXY, we discuss: How the film inevitably creates its own meta-movie, since we all know that Carrie Fisher is dead and that Princess Leia can’t come backIn what ways The Last Jedi is worse or better than The Force AwakensThe film’s theme that the only hope for the future is to let go of the past, or destroy it—and the cost of doing eitherThe ways The Last Jedi changes our understanding of classic Star Wars characters and events, and adds to its universe, andThe tragedy of Luke Skywalker You can hear the full-length discussion, a bonus 40 minutes, for free! Just go to patreon.com/mfgalaxy. You’ll get to hear us yammer endlessly about: The awesomely destructive death toll from Poe refusing to listen to womenThe best destruction scene in Star Wars, everPorgs!The chemistry of the actors and the characters—is it an improvement over The Force Awakens?The sad fates of R2D2 and Luke SkywalkerHow Snoke compares as a villain to Ian McDiarmid’s PalpatineWhere the hell is Lando Calrissian, and…The power of smaller stakes and the true awakening of the Force THE WOMEN OF THE LAST JEDI – BE PART OF THE DISCUSSION ON MF GALAXY! Coming up next episode, join science fiction scholar Lisa Yaszek, Lady Geek Nite convener Sylvia Douglass, and science fiction novelists Jennifer Marie Brissett and Natasha Deen! We’re looking exclusively at the women of The Last Jedi: Rey, Rose, Vice Admiral Holdo, Maz Kanata, Captain Phasma, Paige Tico, and of course Princess Leia!Want to include your voice in MF GALAXY? Entries must be in by Friday, January 5, 2018! WHAT TO DO: Give me your opinion about any of the female characters from The Last Jedi: who they are, what they do, and how well the script and direction treat them. You can comment on any aspect you like, just one character, any combination or comparison, or all of them. HOW TO DO IT: If you choose to contribute, please record your answers into your phone or other audio device as a decent mp3 (preferably 192 kbps or higher, but if you don't know what that means, don't worry about it) and send it to me by Dropbox using mfgalaxypodcast at gmail dot com. PLEASE REMEMBER to introduce yourself by saying, "I'm (your name). I (describe yourself). I want to talk about women characters in The Last Jedi because...." (and then answer whatever questions above you want, or your own ideas). DON’T READ A SCRIPT, but feel free to use notes. Sounding unrehearsed is key. Rambling is just fine. Go as "inside baseball" as you like. Anything under 4 minutes. I can’t guarantee your entry will make it onto the podcast, but I’ll listen to everything and include the most original answers that have broadcast quality sound. Happy recording! WHEN TO SEND IT: Entries must arrive by Friday night, January 5, 2017.

TRAUMA THEORIST KALI TAL ON WHY PTSD IS FAR MORE PERVASIVE THAN MOST PEOPLE THINK, THE HORRIFYING TRUTH ABOUT TRAUMA’S GLOBAL CAUSES + WHY THE DRUG INDUSTRY DOESN’T WANT YOU TO FIGURE IT OUT (MF GALAXY 149) – 2017 December 18

WHY WORKING WITH OTHER PEOPLE IS YOUR BEST SHOT TO RELIEVE PTSD AND FIGHT ITS LOCAL AND GLOBAL CAUSES


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If you watch movies or TV shows such as Rambo or The Punisher and everything in between, you’ve probably seen how Hollywood explores PTSD, or post-traumatic stress disorder. According to US entertainment, PTSD is the horror that former soldiers experience because of war: flashbacks and rage attacks triggered by cars backfiring and footfalls at night. But what if I told you that most of what you’ve been told about PTSD is wrong? That the causes are far more common and complex, and they’re in homes and on streets across the world? That “classic” symptoms such as flashbacks are extremely rare? That the US military is spending a gigantic fortune to cure PTSD, but not for humanitarian reasons? And that the only real cure to PTSD is probably prevention? To discuss these questions today, let’s hear from Cultural and American Studies scholar Kali Tal, who spoke with me by Skype from her home in Bern, Switzerland on December 8, 2017.With combined interests including historiography, cultural anthropology, and African American studies, Tal has spent decades researching the complex causes of PTSD and our dire need to stop traumatising people in the first place. She’s a qualitative researcher and scientific editor at the University of Bern, and the author of Worlds of Hurt: Reading the Literatures of Trauma. And if you’d like to read it for free, keep listening. In today’s episode of MF GALAXY, we discuss: Why feminists pushed for a PTSD diagnosis for years before the psychological establishment accepted it, and why it didn’t work as they’d hopedWhy PTSD is so widespread that in some places, the question should be “Who doesn’t have PTSD?”The class, gender, and cultural biases built into the PTSD establishmentThe disturbing reasons why the US military and drug corporations are so interested in a cure, and the quack therapies being peddled as effectiveAnd why working with other people is your best shot to relieve PTSD and fight its global causes

kalital.com
Read the book: Worlds of Hurt: Reading the Literatures of Traumaworldsofhurt.com
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CELEBRITY CO-AUTHOR NICK CHILES: HOW TO CONVINCE CELEBRITIES TO FACE THEIR UNFLATTERING HISTORIES, BOBBY BROWN’s CONFESSION, WHY ONE CELEBRITY CO-WRITER CAUSES MORE PERSONAL GROWTH THAN ENTOURAGE OF 100 (MF GALAXY 149)

WHAT AL SHARPTON FORCED HIM TO ANSWER WHILE THEY WERE WORKING ON SHARPTON’S BOOK; HOW CELEBRITIES ARE LIKELY TO VIEW A CO-AUTHOR WHO FORCES THEM TO FACE REALITY

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Okay, so you’re a writer and you write a book and if you’re lucky it sells more than ten thousand copies, but you probably sold far less than that and then you’re looking through a bookstore and you find books written by Betty White, Robe Lowe, Patton Oswald, Miley Cyrus, Mindy Kaling, or Justin Bieber (who probably can’t even read)?And you get furious and think how the deck is totally stacked against you, because how can you compete against someone whose book publicity machine is the entire music industry or Hollywood? And then you get smart and say, “How can I get a cut of that action?” And the good news is, you don’t have to be famous to do it. Enter author and now agent Nick Chiles. He’s been in the writing game for more than three decades—not only as the editor-in-chief of Atlanta Blackstar, but as a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and multiple award-winning education reporter, and now as a best-selling author and celebrity co-writer. Chiles has co-created books with singer Bobby Brown, with political organiser Al Sharpton, with former Governor of Massachusetts Deval Patrick, and with NBA star Etan Thomas, among others. So the lesson to all struggling writers is clear: you’re not famous, but you could write with someone who is, get paid, and get to attach the title “best-selling author” to your name for the rest of your career.  Nick Chiles spoke with me on November 6, 2017 by Skype from his office in Atlanta. We discussed:  How to convince celebrities to face and disclose their unflattering history, and the disturbing truth he got Bobby Brown to admitWhat Al Sharpton forced him to answer while they were working on Sharpton’s bookWhy one celebrity co-writer can cause more personal growth than an entourage of a hundred, andHow celebrities are likely to view a co-author who forces them to face reality nickchiles.com SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON iTUNES SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON iHEARTRADIO SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON PLAYER FM SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON STITCHER SUPPORT MF GALAXY ON PATREON FOR MORE INFORMATION + LINKS

TANANARIVE DUE ON GET OUT, THE SOCIAL MEANING OF THE SUNKEN PLACE, AND THE RISE OF AFRICENTRIC HORROR (MF GALAXY 148)

HOW A JORDAN PEELE PRACTICAL JOKE BECAME THE BEST GUEST LECTURE EVER, AFRICAN WOMEN IN GET OUT—MORE HEROIC THAN THEY FIRST APPEAR? WHY DUE’S UCLA FILM COURSE “THE SUNKEN PLACE” IS HER MOST SUCCESSFUL

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I don’t know if there’s anything like Jordan Peele’s blockbuster horror film Get Out. Oh, there have been low-budget Africentric horror movies before, and this one was definitely low-budget: it cost only $4.5 million when the average Hollywood film is around $80 million. But Get Out has earned a quarter of a billion dollars around the world, which further puts the lie to the Hollywood claim that audiences in Europe won’t watch films starring African casts or featuring Africentric stories. Plus, Get Out is an extremely political film. I don’t mean it’s partisan, though: the villains in the film would seem at home at any US Democratic Party fundraiser or power-play. I mean it’s political, in that it’s an unforgettable and horrific satire on US Whitesupremacy. The film and its ideas are so powerful that its central metaphor “The Sunken Place” has entered our culture and vocabulary. And for all those reasons and more, horror writer and UCLA film studies instructor Tananarive Due knew she had to teach a course built around Peele’s film. She called it “The Sunken Place: Racism, Survival, and Black Horror Aesthetic.” Due worked as a journalist for many years, and is also the author of many celebrated novels, including The Living Blood, Devil’s Wake, and Joplin’s Ghost, and the short story collection Ghost Summer. She also co-wrote Freedom in the Family, a memoir of the 1960s US human rights struggle from the perspective of her mother, Patricia Stephens Due, who’d been an activist in it. With her novelist husband Steven Barnes, Due writes the Tennyson Hardwick mystery series in partnership with actor Blair Underwood. She holds a journalism degree and an M.A. in English literature from Leeds, where she specialized in Nigerian literature as a Rotary Foundation Scholar. Due has won the American Book Award, an NAACP Image Award, and the Kindred Award. In 2004, along with Nobel laureate Toni Morrison, Due received the “New Voice in Literature Award” at the Yari Yari Pamberi conference co-sponsored by New York University's Institute of African-American Affairs and African Studies Program and the Organization of Women Writers of Africa. Tananarive Due spoke with me by Skype on November 20, 2017 from her home in California. We discussed: The amazing story of how a Jordan Peele practical joke became the best film studies guest lecture everWhy Tananarive Due’s UCLA film course The Sunken Place has become her most popular course everHow the metaphor of the Sunken Place has entered our culture and its various dimensions of meaningWhat the film says about who appears innocent while being completely complicitAfrican women in Get Out—are they more heroic than they first appear? AndThe controversial Golden Globes categorization of the film as a comedy Of course today’s discussion is 100% spoilerific, so if you haven’t watched Get Out yet, pause the podcast, watch the film, and come back to listen. tananarivedue.com Watch Jordan Peele confirm and debunk some of the most popular theories about hidden themes in 'Get Out'
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PETRIDER PAUL ON FIGHTING THE TANZANIA PRESIDENT TO KEEP PREGNANT GIRLS IN SCHOOL (MF GALAXY 147)

IMBALANCE IN PUNISHMENT BETWEEN THE GIRLS AND THE BOYS AND MEN WHO IMPREGNATED THEM, WHAT NGOS ARE DOING ABOUT THE ABSENCE OF SEX EDUCATION IN TANZANIAN SCHOOLS, THE TANZANIAN GOVERNMENT’S PROPAGANDA CAMPAIGN AIMED AT AND AGAINST GIRLS

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By the end of Malcolm X’s second trip to Africa and the Middle East in 1964, he said at a press conference:
“In every country you go to, usually the degree of progress can never be separated from the woman. If you’re in a country that’s progressive, the woman is progressive. If you’re in a country that reflects the consciousness toward the importance of education, it’s because the woman is aware of the importance of education. “But in every backward country you’ll find the women are backward, and in every country where education is not stressed it’s because the women don’t have education. “So one of the things I became thoroughly convinced of in my recent travels is the importance of giving freedom to the women, giving her education, and giving her the incentive to get out there and put the same spirit and understanding in her children. And I am frankly proud of the contributions that our women have made in the struggle for freedom and I’m one person who’s for giving them all the leeway possible because they’ve made a greater contribution than many of us men.”
Malcolm X made that statement in 1964 following diplomatic missions to African and Arab countries, including to Tanzania. How is Tanzania doing today? On June 22, 2017 Tanzanian President John Pombe Magufuli declared that all public schools must expel any girls who are pregnant. He offered this hopeful advice for post-delivery education, though: “they can learn sewing but they cannot go back to school.” This is the same country in which men can legally marry girls as young as 14 and yet there is no sex education in schools. To have your own government steal your educational future, of course, is not just a tragic loss for any individual and her own children to build a life of their own making. But multiply that theft times thousands of people, and you fundamentally degrade your country’s path towards technological, economic, political, and social innovation and growth. So who’s fighting this man-made disaster in Tanzania? Enter Petrider Paul, who describes herself as “a Proud Feminist advocating to end of gender-based violence.” She’s a co-founder of Youth for Change Tanzania, a global partnership to end early forced marriage and female genital mutilation. She’s worked with numerous organisations including Youth for Change, UNICEF, the United Nations Population Fund, and the Centre for Foreign Relations Tanzania. She’s launched an international petition campaign calling on the Tanzanian government to stop blocking sex education and stop expelling pregnant girls. On November 22, 2017, Petrider Paul spoke with me by Skype from her home in Tanzania. We discussed: The imbalance in punishment between the girls and the boys and men who impregnated themWhat NGOs are doing about the absence of sex education in Tanzanian schoolsThe Tanzanian government’s propaganda campaign aimed at and against girlsThe concerns of her peers and family about her safety while protesting a government that has jailed an opposition MP for speaking against this misogynist anti-education policy.

petriderpaul.blogspot.ca

theirworld.org/authors/petrider-paul
theirworld.org/voices/tanzania-girls-must-be-allowed-back-to-school-after-childbirth
theirworld.org/voices/tanzania-should-end-school-ban-on-pregnant-girls-and-teenage-mothers
nayd.org/in-conversation-with-petrider-paul
youthforchange.org
@PetriderPaul
PETITION:
worldpulse.com/en/community/users/petrider-paul/posts/78300
change.org/p/tanzania-president-john-p-magufuli-let-pregnant-students-complete-their-education

 

DARYLE LAMONT JENKINS – THIS MACHINE DOXXES FASCISTS, or, HOW TO STOP NAZIS FROM DESTROYING THE USA + THE WORLD (MF GALAXY 146)

THE COLOURED FASCISTS WHO WANT TO BE WHITE; WHY FASCISTS CANNOT BE ALLOWED TO BREAK UP THE UNITED STATES AND CREATE THEIR OWN ETHNOSTATE HOMELANDS; WHAT YOU CAN LEARN FROM HIS ANTIFASCIST SUCCESS

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Unless you’re absolutely clueless, you know that self-declared Nazis, fascists, Whitesupremacists, and other extremists using a huge range of names, are on the march. Their goal is a race war. They have weapons. They have training. They’re in police forces and militaries. They have media services in Canada, the US, Russia, and elsewhere. They’ve elected their confederates across the world. And their number one ally occupies the White House. Underestimate them at the peril of the planet.

So how do you fight them? And who’s had success doing it?

Today’s guest is a fascinating figure. He’s a former US Air Force man who's spent a lifetime fighting American neo-nazis and was a pioneer of the early internet with innovative online tactics to fight Whitesupremacists. Today, in service of his cause he speaks across the United States. Liberal and conservative journalists try to smear him; Nazis try to fight him in the courts and lose.

Why do they fear him? Because he doxxes them. That is, he exposes the Nazis who are hiding in plain sight by investigating them and revealing their nazi identity to the world. But he also helps those people who want to leave the nazi movement. He fearlessly steps up to fascists such as Richard Spencer and Matthew Heimbach and simply mocks them, and even got Spencer thrown out of CPAC, the Conservative Political Affairs Conference which was teeming with Spencer's own fanatics.

That is, he exposes the Nazis who are hiding in plain sight by investigating them and revealing their nazi identity to the world. But he also helps those people who want to leave the nazi movement. He fearlessly steps up to fascists such as Richard Spencer and Matthew Heimbach and simply mocks them, and even got Spencer thrown out of CPAC, the Conservative Political Affairs Conference which was teeming with Spencer's own fanatics.

And all this is a 6'4" brother who loves punk music. He's Daryle Lamont Jenkins, one of the founders of the antifascist organisation One People’s Project. And man, does he have great stories to tell.

We spoke by Skype on November 1 and November 8, 2017 while he was on a speaking tour. We discussed:
Whether the US fascist movement is the most dangerous it’s been in our lifetimeHow the US fascists have gotten this farThe surprising new generation of fascists that includes coloured people who want to be WhiteWhy fascists cannot be allowed to break up the United States and create their own ethnostate homelandsWhat Third Positionism is and why it’s a threatHow he got started in antifascism and what you can learn from his success
Daryle Lamont Jenkins on Richard Collins III & Rising Alt-Right TerrorAntifa Heroes or Villains? Exclusive With Daryle Lamont JenkinsDaryle Lamont Jenkins on Richard Collins III & Rising Alt-Right TerrorBTR News: How Should The Black Community View The Antifa Movement w/ Daryle Lamont Jenkins (BTR News)Racism and the Right in the U.S.: a conversation with Daryle Lamont JenkinsFinal Straw: Daryle Lamont Jenkins (Final Straw)Episode 12: Doxxing, Propaganda, and Liberals with Daryle Lamont Jenkins (Friendly Anarchism)This Man Is Kicking White Supremacists’ Ass and Literally Taking Names Meet Daryle Lamont Jenkins, Insatiable Doxxer of Fascists and Nazis
Norman Lear, producer of Good Times, say Jimmy Walker and Ann Coulter are actually dating

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STRANGER THINGS 2 REVIEWED! EKATERINA SEDIA + MINISTER FAUST ON POWER OF RAGE, THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF THE GROUP, THE AMAZING BOB, ELEVEN VS MAX, NOSTALGIC OVER LOVECRAFTIAN EVIL WHILE NORTH AMERICA FACES FASCISM (MF GALAXY 144)

IS THE PUNK EPISODE THE MOST HATED OF SERIES? THE ANTI-FEMINIST DANGER  OF LEARNING HOW TO BE HUMAN FROM ALL MY CHILDREN, WHAT THE HOPPER-EL RELATIONSHIP SAYS ABOUT TRAUMA, WELL-INTENTIONED TERRIBLE PARENTING

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Stranger Things, Season One, is the Netflix hit series that revels in 80s nostalgia and pays homage to everything from ET and The Goonies to Firestarter and Dungeons & Dragons.

It’s  the story of four small-town American boys, Will, Mike, Dustin, and  Lucas, who encounter a mysterious girl named Eleven who possesses  enormous power that threatens to destroy anyone who crosses her—even  agents of the United States government. And all of them and the people  they love are threatened by Lovecraftian annihilation from a force  emanating from a place beyond reckoning: the Upside Down. 

I love Stranger Things, and not just because I’m a child of 80s. I love it because it does what I tried to do with my debut novel The Coyote Kings:  celebrate friendship and young love and science fiction and fantasy  fandom and the heroism of young people. The series is enamoured with its  non-glamourous setting and the innocence of its characters, chief of  which are teenagers played by actual teenagers, harkening to the glory  days of DeGrassi Junior High, rather than having gangly 13-year-olds played by 25 year-old athletes and underwear models.

The  series loves the American science fiction and fantasy movies, TV shows,  and games of my youth, and does them one better—tying them into a  coherent package that rises above 99% of its inspiration. The show makes  me feel like a kid again in the best possible ways.

And now  season 2 is out, and tonight’s SPOILER-INTENSE CONVERSATION features my  guest and friend, the acclaimed science fiction novelist who’s also a  scientist, Ekaterina Sedia. She’s the author of five novels including  the celebrated Heart of Iron. She’s been on MF GALAXY before to talk food, fiction, and feminism, and she’s also maybe just as much a fan of Stranger Things as I am, if that’s actually possible.
Today, we discuss:
How Stranger Things 2 depicts discovering personal power, personal tactics, the power of the group, and the power of rageWhether the punk episode is the most hated of series and if it deserves to beIf Steve is mother of the year, or brother of the yearThe anti-feminist danger of learning how to be human from All My ChildrenThe danger of being Barb or BobWhy standing up to Nazis or Lovecraftian evil by yourself is not the best strategyWhat  the Hopper-El relationship says about trauma, well-intentioned but  terrible parenting, and leaping from prisons of exploitation to prisons  of misguided love, andJoyce’s relationship with the most BASIC character of all ekaterinasedia.com

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