Helen H. Moore's Blog, page 740
June 23, 2016
Abigail Fisher’s Supreme Court loss: A massive blow to mediocre white people coasting on their racial privilege
Abigail Fisher (Credit: AP/Charles Dharapak)
Abigail Fisher, the plaintiff in the latest round of affirmative action cases heard before the Supreme Court, is the perfect villain in a liberal morality play about the evils of racism.
Fisher’s case before the Supreme Court, in which she demanded that she be admitted to the University of Texas at Austin despite not having the grades to get in, confirmed every liberal suspicion about the opposition to affirmative action, namely that it’s not about “equality” at all, but about making sure white people are always first in line, ahead of all people of color, for job and education opportunities. That her lawyer, Edward Blum, has made a career out of creative litigation designed to keep people of color from getting jobs, schooling, and even political representation simply confirms it further.
But all this just makes it all the more emotionally satisfying to report that Fisher was handed a huge defeat in the Supreme Court on Thursday, when conservative justice Anthony Kennedy sided with the liberal side of the court to preserve UT Austin’s admissions protocol aimed at promoting racial diversity at the school.
“A university is in large part defined by those intangible ‘qualities which are incapable of objective measurement but which make for greatness,’” Kennedy wrote in his decision. “Considerable deference is owed to a university in defining those intangible characteristics, like student body diversity, that are central to its identity and educational mission.”
The invocation of “intangible qualities” is especially critical in this case, which addresses a small number of slots the school offered for provisional admission in 2008. These are students that are admitted even though they don’t have the grades or SAT scores that you usually need to get into the school. The school brings these students in anyway because they see potential for them, despite their mediocre scores. Fisher sees herself as one of those people, but the school did not.
In 2008, 47 such students were admitted who had lower grades or test scores than Fisher. Forty-two of them were white. Only five were people of color.
Fisher and her lawyer Blum were not challenging the admission of the 42 white students.
Instead, Fisher’s argument was narrowly that she should have been admitted instead of one of those students of color. It was the case that collapsed any distinction between opposing affirmative action and demanding that white people be given preference.
But, even though this ruling is really narrow and does little to truly increase diversity at universities, Justice Samuel Alito issued a lengthy, blistering dissent that accused the school of paying “little attention to anything other than the number of minority students on its campus and in its classrooms”.
It’s an argument that depends on wholly ignoring the 42 out of 47 students that are white that got in despite having lower grades than Fisher’s. Like Fisher and Blum, Alito simply assumes that the white students have merit and the students of color do not.
It’s sadly not surprising that Alito so quickly defaults to the racist assumption that white people are more deserving of their opportunities than people of color. During his confirmation hearings to the court, it was revealed that Alito had been a member Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP), a group formed in 1972 to keep women and minorities from attending the Ivy League university.
During Alito’s 2006 hearing, Sen. Ted Kennedy read passages from CAP’s magazine, Prospect.
“People nowadays just don’t seem to know their place,” Kennedy read from on 1983 article. “Everywhere one turns, blacks and Hispanics are demanding jobs simply because they’re black and Hispanic. The physically handicapped are trying to gain equal representation in professional sports. And homosexuals are demanding the government vouchsafe them the right to bear children.”
Alito denied agreement, saying the article was “antithetical” to his views. And yet, his dissent from Thursday betrays him, as he wallows in the same false assumption that people of color are only getting education and job opportunities because of their race, and not because they are just as worthy as white people.
Alito wants to portray this decision as some kind of radical progressivism, but in reality, it’s an extremely conservative opinion that, in classic Kennedy fashion, doesn’t do enough to shut down attempts to preserve the white dominance over institutions like elite universities.
“Kennedy’s opinion makes it clear that universities have a high and ongoing burden if they want to maintain affirmative action programs,” Ian Millhiser at Think Progress explains. “It could also potentially inspire a rash of harassment suits targeting these programs.”
Millhiser goes on to highlight how much work UT Austin had to do in order to meet Kennedy’s onerous demands for race-sensitive admissions to be acceptable: Over a year of research and study resulting in a 39-page proposal proving that any other strategy was failing to meet diversity needs. And all this, it’s worth remembering, is only aimed at the tiny fraction of applicants considered on a provisional basis, as most slots are filled by students who meet the grade and SAT requirements. It was such a fight to protect 5 out of 47 students that it pretty much invites future litigation from conservative lawyers who think 5 out of 47 is just too many.
Still, Thursday is a victory all the same, because it’s a blow to this ridiculous notion that any time a person of color gets an opportunity, they are stealing it from a more deserving white person. It’s a good step in the right direction and, if Democrats are able to overcome Republican obstructionism on court appointments, it’s something for future, more liberal judiciaries to build on.
The 5 biggest lies in Donald Trump’s fact-free Hillary speech
Donald Trump (Credit: Reuters/Jonathan Drake)
Donald Trump delivered a “big speech” at his SoHo New York hotel Wednesday, billing the event as a presentation on “the stakes of the election” and “the failed policies and bad judgment of Crooked Hillary Clinton.”
Less-than-stellar polling data has plagued the Trump campaign since last week, when a Washington Post/ABC News poll revealed the presumptive Republican nominee currently hovers around a 70 percent unfavorable rating among likely voters. Trump also came under fire for bragging about his superior foresight in “predicting” the massacre at Pulse nightclub in Orlando.
This week brought increased scrutiny around Trump, including the high-profile ousting of former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, and a meager FEC report that suggests the Trump campaign is in immediate financial danger.
In an effort to reclaim the media narrative, Trump issued a blistering attack against Clinton, basing parts of his speech on yet another, apparently bogus, Clinton tell-all book, Clinton Cash, which as Media Matters reports, recycles “the debunked claim that Clinton failed to block the Russian purchase of American uranium mines after the Russian government donated to the Clinton Foundation and alleged that the Clintons ‘cashed in’ on Clinton’s role as secretary of state through speaking fees.” Trump repeatedly referenced “Cinton Cash” throughout, even quoting text of the book in his speech.
Trump also referenced a similarly spurious book, Crisis of Character, written by a low-level Secret Service agent who described Clinton as “erratic and violent.” It’s no secret that Trump has a penchant for pushing conspiracy theories, but even this one incited a response from the non-partisan Secret Service organization Association of Former Agents of the United States Secret Service (AFAUSSS), which issued a rare denunciation of the book, criticizing the author for making “security harder by eroding the trust between agents and the people they protect.”
In his speech Wednesday, Trump continued his tirade against Clinton, accusing her of being “unfit” for the presidency (yes, you have heard that before). In typical Trump fashion, the presumptive nominee drenched his speech in lies and half-truths, peppering in factual statements where they benefitted him (which wasn’t very often). We broke down the five biggest lies in Trump’s taco salad of a speech.
1. On Foreign Policy:
“It all started with her bad judgment in supporting the war in Iraq in the first place. Though I was not in government service, I was among the earliest to criticize the rush to war, and yes, even before the war ever started. But Hillary Clinton learned nothing from Iraq, because when she got into power, she couldn’t wait to rush us off to war in Libya.”
This claim has been debunked time and time again. While Clinton certainly voted to authorize the war in Iraq, there is no evidence that Trump criticized it “before the war ever started.” In 2002, Trump offered tepid support for the war in an interview with radio host Howard Stern. Immediately after the invasion again, Trump told Fox’s Neil Cavuto the war “looks like a tremendous success” from a military standpoint.
Trump did speak out against the war in July 2004—a full 16 months after the war began. Pressed on these facts by CNN’s Jake Tapper, Trump promised to provide evidence of opposition to the war, saying:
“No, no, but I was against it from before it started. And if you go back and look at that interview, and I’ll get it for you if you want, but that interview was substantially before the war started. It was the first time I was ever asked the question. And even that, it wasn’t like, oh yeah, we should go in. It was a very, like yeah, maybe.”
Tapper told Trump he’d “love” to see evidence of Trump’s vocal opposition to the war. So far, that wish seems to remain unfulfilled.
2. On the Economy:
The United States is “the highest taxed nation in the world.”
This claim sent the fact-checking gurus for the website Politifact into a tailspin, as the clearly exasperated social media manager posted:
Politifact ran the numbers on a variety of measurements for determining how the U.S. economy is taxed, comparing it first with advanced industrialized economies, and again more broadly.
Comparing taxation as a percentage of GDP (26 percent in the U.S.), the Organization for Economic Cooperation ranked us 27th out of 30 countries considered to be our economic peers. Politifact notes:
“Industrialized economies are the best yardstick, but U.S. taxation as a percentage of GDP ranks 12th from the bottom if you compare it with a larger roster of 115 countries.”
So, either way you analyze it, the U.S. is far from the “highest taxed nation in the world.”
3. On Refugees:
“Under [Clinton’s] plan, we would admit hundreds of thousands of refugees from the most dangerous countries on Earth—with no way to screen who they are or what they believe.”
“I only want to admit people who share our values and love our people. Hillary Clinton wants to bring in people who believe women should be enslaved and gays put to death.”
Trump has mentioned the supposed gaps in screening potential refugees seeking asylum in the United States throughout the election. That claim has been debunked time and time again; the process to get a refugee to the United States takes about two years, and involves running names, biographical information, and fingerprints through federal terrorism databases.
Further, Trump’s claim that he wants “to admit people who share our values and love our people,” is a direct contraction to his proposal for a ban on all Muslims entering the United States, considering freedom of religion is one of the core values listed in the First Amendment to the Constitution.
4. On Clinton’s Track Record:
Clinton “has spent her entire life making money for special interests—and I will tell you, she has made plenty of money for them, and she has been taking plenty of money out for herself.”
While Clinton certainly has some explaining to do regarding her high-profile speaking engagements with Wall Street, she certainly didn’t spend her entire career focused on cash-grabbing. As the New York Times notes:
“Early in her career, Mrs. Clinton worked for the Children’s Defense Fund and as a lawyer for the House impeachment inquiry against President Richard Nixon, and later worked at the private Rose Law Firm in Arkansas, focusing on intellectual property and other cases. Much of her career has been devoted to government service, as first lady, United States senator and Secretary of State. But Mrs. Clinton did receive millions of dollars in paid speeches to banks and others and has served on the boards of corporations like Walmart. Mr. Trump argues that she also made money for big donors through her activities at the State Department and her family foundation, but he has not offered clear, convincing proof.”
5. On Lying:
Brian Williams’ career was destroyed for saying far less.
Trump made this remark regarding Clinton’s assertion that while in Bosnia in 1996, she came under sniper fire upon landing. After video of emerged depicting Clinton and daughter Chelsea Clinton welcomed by a warm and excited crowd, the Clinton campaign said she “misspoke” about the dangerous conditions she faced abroad.
In his speech, Trump referred to the multiple instances of former NBC Nightly News host Brian Williams exaggerating the truth about the dangers he faced while covering the Iraq War. The businessman-turned-politician claimed Williams’ career was “destroyed” for his fabrication, while Clinton’s is still in tact despite her lie. Of course, Brian Williams can still be spotted on MSNBC, where he serves as Chief Breaking News Anchor and Chief Elections Anchor for MSNBC. And considering Politifact rates 59 percent of all Trump’s claims as “False” or “Pants on Fire,” the Republican nominee may not get a lot of mileage out of this particular lie.
June 22, 2016
Definitely not Harry Potter anymore: Daniel Radcliffe on “Swiss Army Man”’s absurd bromance, prosthetic butt effects and his desert island albums
Daniel Radcliffe (Credit: AP/Matt Sayles)
With his role as a farting corpse in “Swiss Army Man,” Daniel Radcliffe takes on a part far removed from “Harry Potter.” It follows this talented young actor’s distinctive performances that include a stage role in “Equus,” his portrayal of Allen Ginsberg in “Kill Your Darlings” and even his turn as Igor in last year’s underrated “Victor Frankenstein.”
In “Swiss Army Man,” Radcliffe plays Manny, the farting corpse that washes up on shore where the castaway Hank (Paul Dano) is about to kill himself. Hank resists suicide, and instead, rides Manny like a jet-ski. Cue opening credits.
The film, directed by “the Daniels” (Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert), may sound like it’s out there—and it is—but Dano and Radcliffe commit to it completely. “Swiss Army Man” celebrates its (and the characters’) weirdness as the guys develop a bromance while navigating their way back to civilization using Manny’s erection as a kind of homing device. The film depicts crude behavior such as farting, masturbation, and poop, but it also emphasizes messages about love, doing what makes you happy, and feeling something, rather than nothing.
Radcliffe gives a literally full-bodied performance, as the title character. He bares his ass whenever Hank needs some gas propulsion, spews water out of his mouth so Hank can drink (especially after carrying Manny around on his back), and is ruled by his joystick of a penis. The actor spoke with Salon about playing Manny and all the weird and wonderful work that involved.
With this film, have you actively tried to distance yourself from Harry Potter? What appealed to you about playing a farting corpse?
That’s the thing; I’m absolutely not trying to distance myself. It’s in other people’s minds. I have no desire to make people forget about “Harry Potter.” It’s part of my life, and I am proud of it. But I do want to do interesting and different work. I was never going to play Harry forever. This was a chance to do something crazy and different. Part of it was I got to page three where Hank rides Manny across the ocean like a jet ski. If I saw Paul Dano ride someone else, I would have felt I’d really missed out. I was an easy sell on the script. It was funny, well written and fucking ambitious. It was aiming for funny stupid and mad and anarchic and was profound and sweet and moving and incredibly earnest at the same time.
Do you have concerns about alienating fans with such a career move? I think my nieces who adore “Harry Potter” would be taken aback by “Swiss Army Man.”
I don’t think you can make decisions based on what you think people want you to do. It’s doing what I enjoy and what I am passionate about. Towards the end of “Harry Potter,” I did “Equus,” and I feel like if you survive that moment, and I didn’t alienate you then, then I’m not going to alienate you now. Either the fans won’t watch me, or they’ll think I was doing something interesting and are supportive. If you want to drive yourself crazy in this industry, you can plan for what other people think you should do, or worry about other people’s perception.
You have terrific deadpan comic delivery as Manny, but what is extraordinary about your performance is your sheer physical qualities. I think it’s hilarious when Manny is splayed out in the forest, or can’t keep his head up in the cave. I know there was a stunt Manny. How did you develop the character’s comic timing and contortions?
I’m proud to say it was mostly me. The physical challenge was why I wanted to take the job. There is so much comedy in that, and I like to think I’m good at falling over and doing stupid physical comedy. A lot of it was Paul and I choreographing the scene. There’s a certain moment when I look at Sports Illustrated, so we worked out when I would slip and fall over or nudge my head to work out the language of each scene. We rehearsed at first, but then it was super easy because Paul and I knew he would do something and I would react in a way that was appropriate. We improvised with each other by the end.
Manny’s bromance with Hank is what keeps the film compelling. Can you talk about how you actively worked with Paul Dano—or even against him—to help each other perform so well together?
I think at first Paul’s character is uncomfortable with the idea that Manny is a dead guy, and that [Hank] may be crazy, but then there is a physical ease. I loved working with Paul and I really felt I was there to not fuck up Paul’s shots, because he carried so much of the film. The emotional weight of him talking about his father…so I was there to support him and help him, and not be too much of a heavy fucking lump to carry around.
The film’s messages are about being weird, but also comfortable in your own skin. Can you talk about how you are weird, and what makes you comfortable doing all the strange things in “Swiss Army Man?”
How am I weird? I think I’m weird in a bunch of ways, but everyone does, and they think their weirdness only applies to them. “Swiss Army Man” is about making them not taboo, and identifying with others—that we are not alone in our weirdness. That helps with self-acceptance and that helps us love and be loved. That message is in the film, but there’s also a farting corpse jet-ski thing. Profundity and ridiculousness working under the same banner—that’s why this film is exciting and unique to me. [Co-writer/director] Daniel Scheinert gave a description of the film as “an olive branch from the weirdos to the closet weirdos.”
Can you talk about the special effects—Manny spewing water, farting, getting erect and the challenges of that work? Was there a point where you drew the line?
[Laughs]. I never drew that line in this film. There’s one shot where I offered my ass out to them. They thought that would be fine. The special effects by Jason Hamer are practical. He created the mold of my butt, and they put a pipe in so they could blow air into a prosthetic butt that farted. And the water spewing was something he jammed into my mouth and operated off camera. There was an animatronic dick that acted as a compass. There is something incredibly funny having an animatronic penis being operated off camera.
“Swiss Army Man” has an important message of love, and doing what makes you happy. In fact, there is a beautiful thought that helps the characters keep going. What thoughts keep you going?
Getting to work and being on film sets. I love working on set. It’s a place of immense comfort for me. That’s my joyous space. I also love my friends and family—not an original answer, I know—but that’s what I live for. Hanging out with them and just watching TV.
The film also addresses issue of fear. What scares you, or what are you afraid of?
I supposed I’m afraid of getting older like everyone is. And the idea that I won’t be able to do things I do now. Like all actors, I have a fear that a guy in a suit will arrive and say I won’t get to make films anymore. That’s my fear: If anyone takes away my job.
If you were stuck on a desert island, what would you want to have with you to survive?
I feel I would be OK if I had some way of playing music. And I had 10 albums I could last without going insane. That would be my luxury item. And a knife or spear for catching food.
What music do you listen to?
I’m excited by the Libertines’ most recent album, and M. Ward, who’s fantastic.
I‘d take the Beach Boys. I like being on the beach and listening to “Good Vibrations.”
If you had a special power, as your farting corpse does, what would it be?
I would like the ability to make fire by pricking my fingers like Manny does.
Given all you have done in screen so far, what role do you want to take on next?
I’m doing a play in New York that’s about to open called “Privacy,” which I’m excited about. And like every actor, I have aspiration to direct. I’d like to write as well. I’m in no rush though. I’m happy to carry on acting. I don’t know what’s going to come up next. I can’t predict, but three years ago I never thought I’d read “Swiss Army Man.”
White privilege rules Litchfield — and Piper isn’t even the best example anymore
Blair Brown; Taylor Schilling in "Orange Is the New Black" (Credit: Netflix/Jojo Whilden)
Among the many benefits granted by the age of streaming TV is a deeper level of hindsight. Think high-definition clarity, something more than 20/20. For instance, thanks to clickable platforms such as Netflix, I can tell the exactly moment that I began detesting Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling): It happened at the 42-minute, 39-second point of “Orange Is the New Black’s” series premiere.
In that moment Piper, overwhelmed by her first day in Litchfield Penitentiary, walked into Correctional Officer Joe Caputo’s office and immediately caught a case of the weepies.
“Mr. Caputo,” she squeaks through quivering lips, “please let call my fiancé. I have to let him know I’m OK.” Caputo grants her two minutes on his office phone, and in those 120 seconds she whines about her granny panties and reveals she has only spoken to white people. She thinks they’re the only ones who will share their shampoo. Their banter moves on to takeout. You know, the important things.
Honestly, why wouldn’t Caputo give Piper two minutes on his private phone? She’s just a nice girl in a not-so-nice place, and she asked nicely. She has manners. She’s polite!
Now, imagine one of Piper’s African American peers making the same request. Let’s make it an apples-to-apples comparison: Let’s say the person in question is Poussey (Samira Wiley), the sweet, multilingual child of an Army officer and a woman with a master’s degree in art history.
It’s highly doubtful that the C.O. would have handed her the receiver and instructed her to dial ‘9’ for an outside line.
Series creator Jenji Kohan based “Orange Is the New Black” on a memoir by Piper Kerman who, like Chapman, is an upper-middle class white woman who did time in a minimum security prison. From the series’ beginning, Schilling played up the script’s comedic notes to accentuate Piper’s sense of entitlement. Kohan presumably intended the character to serve as a heightened parody of pampered upper-crust whiteness to put the rest of the prisoners into context.
Unlike other scripted series, Piper hasn’t grown more universally relatable as “Orange” progressed. Quite the opposite: in season four, as I said in my original review, it’s pretty tough to see Piper as anything less than despicable — not just because she inadvertently founded a white supremacist gang, oopsie! Not because she tries crack, or describes herself as “gangsta – like, with an ‘A’ at the end.”
Not for any of that. Rather, it’s because from the moment we met Piper Chapman, she has represented the worst of elements of white privilege.
That term, “white privilege,” has been tossed around so much in today’s culture, dropped in the context of conversations about social justice and racial inequity, in an era when people still debate whether the #BlackLivesMatter movement is really necessary, and shouldn’t it be all #AllLivesMatter?
A fair number of people have become sick of hearing the words “white privilege,” and I’ve encountered more than a few who don’t appreciate any implication that they benefit from it. Few concepts are more certain to ignite a long trail of pointed, passionate comments on a tweet or a Facebook post.
But the reason “Orange Is the New Black” has been digging through the guts of white privilege from the start is because Piper serves a stand-in for the average viewer. Implicitly, Piper makes viewers see the perks afforded to them, or denied them, by that privilege. (Even the name of her illicit dirty panty business, Felonious Spunk, is a cutesy version of cultural appropriation; she can play with the name of a famous African American jazz musician, but are any black girls on her payroll?)
“Orange Is the New Black” owes its very existence to white privilege, in fact. In a 2013 NPR interview, Kohan called Piper’s character her “Trojan Horse”: “You’re not going to go into a network and sell a show on really fascinating tales of black women, and Latina women, and old women and criminals,” Kohan admitted. “But…the girl next door, the cool blonde, is a very easy access point, and it’s relatable for a lot of audiences and a lot of networks looking for a certain demographic. It’s useful.”
Kohan’s strategy amounts to this: Piper’s life story isn’t nearly as fascinating as that of “Crazy Eyes” (Uzo Aduba) and lacks the poignancy of Taystee’s (Danielle Brooks) who, it was revealed, has spent so much time bouncing through the system that she’s more comfortable inside of prison than in the outside world. It has none of the fire that drives Aleida (Elizabeth Rodriguez) or Ruiz (Jessica Pimentel) who, thanks to Piper’s selfish machinations, receives a punishment this season wildly out of proportion to the infraction for which she was caught. Even Tiffany “Pennsatucky” Doggett (Taryn Manning) or Piper’s ex, Alex Vause (Laura Prepon), are more fascinating subjects.
Thus, Piper has become less and less central to “Orange Is the New Black” with each new season.
In exploring the lives of the women around her, though, the Netflix dramedy is one of the few that effectively reminds its viewers that minorities and the underclass are not monolithic. Each African-American woman in Litchfield carries a very different burden than their Latina peers. Dominicans, Puerto Ricans and Mexicans bring different brands of cultural pride to the table, which is examined more closely this season.
Each person’s culture and family, their lives on the outside, inform what they do in Litchfield.
Season four also shows us that white privilege is by no means a one-size-fits all term; it has its own levels of stratification built in. Piper can use her perceived pull to give the new cadre of guards an excuse to enact “stop and frisk” inside the prison and target the black and brown inmates, because that aligns with their collective urge to exercise their power over these women. By virtue of her skin color, Piper can be secure in knowing that one of the C.O.s would never, say, put a gun to her head and force her to swallow live vermin for his entertainment.
But she can’t talk her way into a cushy cell with bunk-side meal delivery, as Litchfield’s celebrity inmate, lifestyle maven Judy King (Blair Brown) does. By dint of her celebrity status and expertise in spinning the media, King transforms a potentially disastrous video showing her as the star of a racist puppet show, “Chitlin’ Joe and Watermelon Sam,” into a publicity coup when she “leaks” a photo of her kissing Black Cindy (Adrienne Moore).
King is also all too happy to allow Poussey to bask in her limelight when the latter’s own girlfriend Soso (Kimiko Glenn) sold the star a false sob story painting Poussey as the child of a prostitute. Nothing awakens a person’s inner white privilege than the thought that just by being an example of “the ideal,” she’s changing a life. (Soso, too, is learning about her own sense of privilege and entitlement, one founded more in socioeconomics than skin color.)
With King’s celebrity and bank account inspiring the prison’s management, MCC, to make her queen of the castle, she also topples Red (Kate Mulgrew) from the top tier of Litchfield’s social hierarchy. The old guard respected Red’s work ethic: she maintained order in the kitchen and with her (all-white, it must be said) family of choice, doing her best to keep the on the straight and narrow. She bootstrapped her way to the top of Litchfield’s social mountain.
But Red does not have a media empire and lawyers with four-figure hourly rates, and by the end of season four she’s as much of a punching bag as the rest.
In putting her unapologetic selfishness and knack for self-preservation out front, though, King nevertheless emerges from this season smelling rosier than Piper. At least she knows who she is.
“Look. I’m trying,” King tells Poussey. “I mean, maybe I am a racist. Maybe I’m just too stupid to know it. But shit…I am the friendliest racist that you are ever going to meet. So can’t we all just get along?”
Such naked self-awareness of privilege is refreshing at this point in the series – and to be fair to Piper, Kohan and her writers allow her a measure of that too. It only took the ruining of a few lives and being branded with a swastika to get there.
“My parents didn’t teach me to be like this,” Piper admits to her friends in a stolen, drug-induced moment of honesty. “…I think I’ve been trying to win prison.”
To reassure her, Vause says, “You’re not the worst person in here, Piper.”
In that second? Maybe not. But there’s always season five. She’s got time.
Is “The Neon Demon” gruesome misogyny or brilliant feminist commentary? Can it be both?
Elle Fanning in "The Neon Demon" (Credit: Amazon Studios)
Any number of movies have been made about the depravity of Los Angeles and the moral vacuum of the illusion industries at that city’s heart. It’s virtually a genre of self-loathing all to itself, from Billy Wilder’s “Sunset Boulevard” to Sofia Coppola’s “The Bling Ring.” Nicolas Winding Refn’s fashionista horror film “The Neon Demon,” which is something like the bastard offspring of Brian De Palma and David Cronenberg, with a dollop of David Lynch on the down-low, definitely belongs to that tradition. But “The Neon Demon” is a striking and unusual L.A. story in several respects, not least because most of it occurs indoors.
Sure, there are a few establishing shots of the Pasadena motel where Jesse (Elle Fanning), the teenage aspiring model at the heart of this twisted tale, is staying. In one of Refn’s perverse casting coups, the bearlike motel manager, who is at best a low-grade crook and at worst a vicious sexual predator, is played by Keanu Reeves. (As you may have guessed already, this is not the kind of movie where “reality” is some stable and reliable state.) There are a couple of sequences set in backyards or pool patios and one deliberately stereotypical scene shot at night in the Hollywood Hills, overlooking the city. But we never see the beach, and only catch glimpses of palm trees in the middle distance. Southern California’s legendarily blue skies are no more than a distant design element. Jesse’s saga of life and death in L.A. is almost literally set among the damned souls in hell, a modern-day Brothers Grimm fable that unfolds in rooms where black magic is performed.
Like all the Danish director’s previous films — which include the international hit “Drive,” the underappreciated British crime saga “Bronson” and the hallucinatory revenge drama “Only God Forgives,” possibly the slowest action movie ever made — “The Neon Demon” conflates style and substance to deliberately disorienting effect. In another era, I would have described it as walking a fine line between art and trash. But since no one perceives such distinctions anymore, we can put it another way: Refn is profoundly unconcerned with your comfort or pleasure, in any conventional sense. He wants you to think bad thoughts and wants you to know that he does too. This story of brutal female jealousy and female narcissism is purposefully titillating and purposefully disturbing, and risks devolving into ludicrous self-parody at almost every moment. Whether you think it’s a brilliant feminist commentary or misogynistic softcore porn is entirely up to you. And who says those things cancel each other out?
I don’t think it’s remotely accidental that Refn wrote “The Neon Demon” with a pair of female co-writers (Mary Laws and Polly Stenham) or that its stark and hypnotic images were shot by Natasha Braier (previously the cinematographer of several noteworthy Latin American and European films, including “XXY” and “In the City of Sylvia.”) If Refn was venturing into the treacherous terrain of female beauty and female rivalry, where so many voyeuristic male filmmakers have gone before, he thought he might be better off with some strong women at his side. When we first see Jesse, a 16-year-old from Georgia who is passing herself off as 19 in order to get modeling gigs, she is nearly naked and covered in blood and glitter, while some sinister-looking guy snaps photos of her in a darkened studio. The blood is fake, at least this time around, and the photographer is a guy named Dean (Karl Glusman, of Gaspar Noé’s 3-D sex movie “Love”), who is also new in town and nearly as innocent as Jesse. But as dramatic foreshadowing goes, it isn’t subtle and isn’t meant to be.
Jesse gets noticed at the photo shoot by a wry, redheaded makeup artist named Ruby (an archly honed performance by Jena Malone), who thrusts herself forward as the new best friend and confidant that a doe-in-headlights like Jesse clearly needs. If Ruby has a not-so-hidden agenda, at least she’s not an all-out carnivorous monster like her so-called friends Sarah (Abbey Lee) and Gigi (Bella Heathcote), a pair of willowy veteran models who find themselves north of the legal drinking age and have had so much work done they’re starting to resemble the Daryl Hannah replicant from “Blade Runner.” In fact, that Ridley Scott classic is another influence on “The Neon Demon,” although I hadn’t thought of it till now. Ruby introduces Jesse to Gigi and Sarah at a downtown L.A. performance-art event so sparsely attended the city appears to have been hit with a neutron bomb. This isn’t just a movie about indoor space but about empty space; if the symbolism seems way too obvious that’s because Refn doesn’t even see it as symbolism. He sees it as empty space, fields of light and color and darkness.
Sarah and Gigi view Jesse with halfway affectionate contempt, for about five seconds, until they realize that this little nobody from nowhere, who doesn’t even understand how many casting directors and photographers you have to sleep with to get anywhere, has something they’ve never had and never will. “You have to admit, she has something,” Ruby reflects in a scene where the other girls goad a diner waitress into reciting all the daily specials they are super-obviously not going to order. Jesse’s something, whatever it is, immediately captures the attention of a prominent modeling agent (Christina Hendricks), a star photographer with a reputation for lechery (Desmond Harrington) and a famous and fatuous designer (Alessandro Nivola), not to mention the far less desirable attention of Hank, the motel troll played by Reeves.
But if I’m making it sound like “The Neon Demon” is a movie driven by a rags-to-riches story, or even by a catfight revenge plot, I’m leading you at least slightly astray. It’s much more a series of disturbing but unforgettable images in disconnected indoor spaces, pushed along by the Lynchian sense that Jesse is chasing something that despite her youth and beauty she can never catch. There really is a neon demon in this movie, a recurring unexplained vision of three purple triangles that may be hallucinatory visions or extra-textual interpolations or something else. There’s also a mountain lion that gets into Jesse’s Pasadena motel room, a scene of both metaphorical and literal vampirism and a supremely implausible episode of necrophilia.
Some viewers have complained that “The Neon Demon” slides too far into the gruesome Italian horror-movie vein known as giallo in the final act. I would say, first of all, consider yourself cautioned. Then I would ask, what the hell do you expect? From the Helmut Newton-style images to the throbbing industrial score by Cliff Martinez (in Refn’s movies, music is always a defining element) to the terrifying, affectless performances of Lee and Heathcote as the monster-models, no aspect of “The Neon Demon” points toward a satisfying, naturalistic or audience-friendly wrap-up. If you want to see Tony Scott’s porny vampire drama “The Hunger” again — to cite another obvious influence — hey, I just checked and it costs $2 on Amazon. But if you want a movie that eviscerates “The Hunger” and eats its bloody insides while daring you to look away, here it is.
Free Led Zeppelin: “This is about music, it’s not about sound”
Robert Plant (Credit: AP/Joel Ryan)
The federal court trial considering whether Led Zeppelin stole from a Spirit song for its ubiquitous “Stairway to Heaven” is moving toward its conclusion. Zeppelin singer Robert Plant took the stand Tuesday, saying he did not remember hearing the instrumental “Taurus” and describing in detail the way he wrote “Stairway” with guitarist Jimmy Page.
But the case is about a legal concept as much as musical ones – the plagiarism of intellectual property. Salon spoke to the Charles Cronin, who teaches at USC’s Gould School of Law and has written extensively on musical plagiarism. He’s also founder of the Music Copyright Infringement Resource, now housed at the university.
Salon spoke to Cronin from his home in Los Angeles; the interview has been lightly edited for clarity.
So between “Stairway to Heaven” and “Spirit,” how close to the songs seem to you?
The openings to both songs seem very similar. But that means nothing in terms of potential liability for copyright infringement.
Right – so if the resemblance isn’t the issue, what’s the legal issue when we’re talking about copyright?
If we were talking about a distinctive melodic line, that would be a different. But what we’re talking about – no matter how you parse is – is musical material that’s in the public domain.
So the question is how does the law deal with public domain material that sounds similar.
The chord progression apparently goes back to the 16th century, and can be played all kinds of ways. In this case, it’s plucked.
Right – they’re simply arpeggiating the chord, breaking the chord into its individual elements so you hear the sonic residue of each of those pitches, so you hear them as a chord rather than a melodic line.
To you, then, the case doesn’t make much sense.
It makes sense as an opportunistic attempt to shake down Led Zeppelin. But it’s no more than that. What the plaintiff is hoping for and perhaps counting on is the possibility of the jury finding the songs impermissibly similar – not on a legal basis but from the fact that they simply do sound the same. But this is about music, it’s not about sound.
And this is the problem with this case and an increasing number of these disputes since the 1960s, when popular music became more about sonic exploration and assembling popular works with sound rather than musical ideas. So I think what’s happening in this case is the plaintiff’s are hoping that a jury will decide the case on the basis of the fact that parts of the songs sound remarkably similar.
What did you make of the “Blurred Lines” case?
It’s very, very similar in fact. The Marvin Gaye work, as I recall, was just a bunch of brief melodic snippets that he just recorded. They were used as the basis for the song; the value of the song lay entirely in its performance. If anyone else but Marvin Gaye had performed that work, no one would be interested in it and the case would never have been brought. And “Blurred Lines” imitated some of the sounds in the Marvin Gaye song. But the musical expression wasn’t sufficiently original to be protected.
What’s the danger of these cases? If there is, as you argue, overzealous prosecution, what are the stakes?
The large picture is the danger of shutting down musical creativity in the popular music world. It inhibits popular music from imitating or paying homage to a prior popular songwriter. It’s very insidious: It puts a huge intimidating aura over the entire creative process, especially today when music is not created by Irving Berlin or George Gershwin sitting alone at a piano. It’s a very ad hoc, improvisational process. Most of the value of the popular works is later added by recording engineer and acoustical engineer – that’s where a lot of the appeal lies. The idea of locking up or prohibiting sounds – as opposed to musical expression – is potentially very intimidating.
The other danger is there will be far more opportunistic suits: Amateur musicians will begin to think this is the standard of copyright law, that if things are sonically similar that constitutes infringement – they’ll simply bring an increasing number of suits against deep-pocketed musicians and recording companies. I think the most regrettable result is when deep-pocketed musicians settle: When word gets out that these people are easy targets for shakedowns, it’s a vicious cycle. It will starve the recording companies and starve people who have made it as popular musicians.
The other side of this argument says that musical expression needs to be protected. And that without it — if someone can just take it — there’s no incentive to create new work. How do we protect originality without chilling it?
I think the legal system works quite effectively: It protects original expression. If you have an original work, copyright law protects it. I think the problem comes from confusion over what constitutes musical expression, and what is musical techniques that devolves to sound. That’s a completely different element.
These cases are about musical works. And popular music today tend to have very little original musical expression. It’s typically by musicians who really don’t understand music – they may understand sound, or in a crude way how you put something together. But they don’t understand intellectually how it’s constructed, the relationship between the pitches you’re working with. If you don’t understand that, you can’t be very original. So popular musicians build songs using sonic blocks.
What about Led Zeppelin’s history of taking significant bits of blues and folk songs without credit? Does that seem relevant here?
I don’t think to this particular dispute. My belief, and I think I’m probably in the minority, is that unless a purportedly infringing work essentially supplants the first work in the marketplace or the public sphere, I don’t think it sound be considered an actionable infringement.
It sounds like as far as you’re concerned, the case is groundless.
Utterly meritless, yes.
Rubio’s running! It turns out Marco wasn’t done with the Senate after all
Marco Rubio (Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin)
Despite months of saying that if he wasn’t elected president this cycle he wouldn’t seek re-election to the Senate, it turns out Marco Rubio is going to run to keep his seat after all. Which is kind of funny, given that he tweeted this only a little over a month ago:
I have only said like 10000 times I will be a private citizen in January.
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) May 17, 2016
The GOP is going to have to fight to keep control of the Senate and House this election, so party bosses are looking to keep any seat they can, any way they can. And that includes urging Rubio to reconsider his ultimatum of either being elected president or becoming a private citizen.
Poll data shows that @marcorubio does by far the best in holding onto his Senate seat in Florida. Important to keep the MAJORITY. Run Marco! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 27, 2016
Nearly all the Republicans who had started to run to fill Rubio’s seat are expected to drop out to clear the way for him.
His opponent in the fall will likely be Patrick Murphy, who won his election to the House of Representatives in 2012 against an incumbent Republican.
Murphy has already begun attacking Rubio for the statements he made during his presidential campaign which including disparaging the Senate and saying he wouldn’t run.
“Marco Rubio abandoned his constituents, and now he’s treating them like a consolation prize,” Murphy said in a statement earlier today. “Unlike Marco Rubio, I love working hard every single day for the people of Florida.”
A super PAC, American Bridge 21st Century, even put together a supercut of all the times Rubio slammed the Senate and career politicians.
Discriminated against and misunderstood: Being gay and Muslim in the wake of the Orlando massacre
Raquel Saraswati
It’s nearly impossible to process that one man could take 49 lives as Omar Marteen did last weekend in Orlando. It is especially hard to process for America’s gay Muslims — not only were the victims targeted for being homosexual, Donald Trump and his ilk have doubled down on proposals to tighten restrictions on people who they suspect as terrorists, which, in their eyes, is synonymous with all Muslims. (It’s also worth noting that over one-third of Muslims in the U.S. are native-born citizens — including Marteen, who was born in New York.)
Whether or not people acknowledge that the root of attack was homophobia, many on the right largely want to blame it on Islam. Some even imply that homophobia somehow exists only within Islam. Donald Trump is the notable example, but he’s not the first to suggest it.
“Homophobia and transphobia, unfortunately, exist everywhere,” says Sahar Shafqat, a gay Muslim woman. “They exist in all societies; they exist in all faith traditions. To say that they exist in Muslim societies and Muslim communities is to state the obvious. Yes, of course, it does exist. But to suggest that it exists uniquely just within Muslim communities is a really dangerous proposition to put out there.”
Shaqfat, 44, is a founding member of the Muslim Alliance for Sexual and Gender Diversity (MASGD).
Raquel Saraswati, who also works at MASGD, said Islam continues to be unfairly seen as spreading homophobia.
“My faith is not homophobic, but I’ve certainly encountered people within it who are,” said Saraswati.
“There’s no denying: I absolutely get a lot of hate from the Muslim community even if it a fringe portion. It is very loud and it can be very scary. I’ve been stalked; I’ve been threatened,” Saraswati added.
Pew Research found in 2014 that 45% of American Muslims accept homosexuality, which, while admittedly low compared to most Americans (62% of all Americans supported homosexuality in 2016), it is still higher that evangelical Protestants and Mormons.
Ani Zonneveld, the president of Muslims for Progressive Values, does not deny there is a homophobic problem within Islam and she explained the history of homophobia in Islam.
“It’s a recent phenomenon,” Zonneveld, 53, says. “We were not homophobic prior to a 100 years ago, unlike Christianity where criminalization of homosexuality has been at the root of it’s theology for centuries.” Most of it, she said, comes from Saudi Arabia’s wahhabism. But she pointed out that in terms of exporting homophobia, American Christians have been leading that charge in Africa.
Yet somehow, this idea of Islam as uniquely homophobic persists. Which then gets spun into Islamophobia.
“Everyone will be implicated as being radicals,” Zonneveld says. “‘This guy was American born — how do we trust American Muslims?’ It just feeds into the Trump political narrative that all Muslims should be barred or should be kicked out. It’s just adding fuel to the already existing fire of anti-Muslim and anti-Islam sentiment in America.”
“I’m experiencing a lot of anxiety and a lot of fear of the backlash, that is already happening against Muslims,” Shaqfat says. “[Clinton and Trump] are both are calling for basically the same thing. They are calling for demonizing Muslims.”
This demonization extends into spaces you might think (or hope) would be tolerant of all creeds: “I often find myself experiencing Islamophobia in queer spaces and experiencing homophobia in Muslim spaces and experiencing both in other spaces altogether,” Shaqfat says.
If the only takeaway from the Orlando massacre is a continued villainization of all Muslims, we actually cause another problem, says Saraswati.
“The problem, or the frustration, for queer Muslims is that the world is telling us that we have to pick one or the other,” Shafqat says. “We really reject that because it’s impossible to pick one over the other. It would be like being half human; we need to be able to express our full humanity.”
Anti-abortion activists attack George W. Bush’s daughter for praising Planned Parenthood
Barbara Bush and Cecile Richards sitting for lunch at Gotham Bar and Grill in the New York City. (Credit: New York Times)
Over the weekend, the New York Times published an interview with a perhaps unlikely pair — Planned Parenthood CEO Cecil Richards and Barbara Bush, daughter of former president George W. Bush.
Noting that Richards’ mother, Ann, and Barbara’s father ran against each other for governor of Texas decades ago, the Times reported that “there was no trace of animosity when the women met for lunch” recently.
“They are enthusiastic supporters of each other’s work,” Philip Galanes wrote, noting that the two women share a “great commonality: women’s and global health.” The Bush daughter runs an organization with her sister called Global Health Corps that supports young leaders in health care across the world. She told the Times that her organization and Planned Parenthood are both encouraging young people to create “social change.”
“Global Health started because this great talent pipeline was not moving into health care,” Bush said. “It’s hard to know how you fit in if you’re not a doctor or nurse. If we can demystify that and create channels into Planned Parenthood and other exceptional organizations, then we’ll have an army of people working to solve health problems.”
The interview, and that passage in particular, grabbed the attention of anti-abortion activists.
Breitbart complained that “Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards and GWB Daughter Barbara Bush Celebrate Lots in Common At Lunch.”
“Barbara Bush Calls Planned Parenthood Abortion Biz an “Exceptional Organization,” a headline at LifeNews.com read. Alex Jones’ conspiratorial InfoWars highlighted Bush’s “exceptional organization” comment. As did Ben Shapiro’s alternative right-wing site Daily Wire:
To the surprise of many pro-lifers, not only was Bush pictured laughing and enjoying lunch with Richards, but she called American’s largest abortion mill, responsible for well over 300,000 abortions annually, an “exceptional organization.”
But as Rewire’s Jodi Jacobson noted, the support of Planned Parenthood from a member of the Bush family should hardly come as a surprise to anti-abortion activists:
The Bush family has a long history of support for Planned Parenthood. Prescott Bush, father of George H. W. Bush (Bush 1) and grandfather of Bush 2 was the treasurer of Planned Parenthood when it launched its first national fundraising campaign in 1947. Birth control being controversial in the period pre- Griswold v. Connecticut (and yes, history obviously repeats itself), Prescott Bush was attacked for his pro-choice position and knocked out of the running for a Senate seat in Connecticut.
Still, conservatives on Twitter still lashed out at Bush:
George W. Bush’s Daughter Says Planned Parenthood Is ‘Exceptional’…Over Lunch With Cecile Richards https://t.co/gBgAnTkek5
— John Nolte (@NolteNC) June 22, 2016
Barf Bag: Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards and GWB Daughter Barbara Bush Celebrate Lots in Common At Lunch https://t.co/6gsfG2QQwW
— #JeSuisJuive (@lamblock) June 20, 2016
PICTURED: Bush With Leader Responsible for Death of Millions pic.twitter.com/yUQQypRdbY
— F. Bill McMorris (@FBillMcMorris) June 22, 2016
Barbara Bush Calls Planned Parenthood Abortion Biz an “Exceptional Organization” https://t.co/7bsEbdyKA7 No cost? Ask the babies the cost…
— Seek Truth (@joemonroe5) June 22, 2016
Barbara Bush Thinks Planned Parenthood Is an ‘Exceptional Organization’ https://t.co/ByJP8eYT9k
To bad her mother didn't abort her
— Eric S. (@ForexEric) June 21, 2016
I'm very skeptical of "conservative" politicians that fail to instill conservative values in their children https://t.co/tXaUzxFWfM
— Renegade Jew (@bzyouthdirector) June 22, 2016
Dubya's daughter, Barbara, is a disappointment. https://t.co/Hmopu42XqX
— (((Mr. 何))) (@catholiclawyer) June 22, 2016
https://t.co/GSDYZLd6yJ via @BreitbartNews
REAL reason Bushies support Killer-y. They believe murdering babies is A-OK. Christians? Hardly
— Marilyn Leiker (@kansasbabe) June 20, 2016
“We are at war here”: David Byrne pens passionate call for gun control
David Byrne (Credit: AP/Andy Kropa)
David Byrne has joined the chorus of voices calling for expanded gun control measures in the wake of this month’s mass shooting in Orlando. In an essay posted on his website Wednesday, Byrne details his thoughts on how to address the gun violence epidemic and explains why he’s hopeful that change will come.
“It’s not about taking away everyone’s guns,” the former Talking Heads frontman writes. “It needn’t be all or nothing, in other words.”
“How could you conclude anything other than that we Americans are living in a war zone?” Byrne asks, detailing statistics on gun-related violence. America, Byrne writes, is “so far out of line compared to every other developed (and most of the not developed) nations that outsiders look at us and wonder what kind of crazy savages we must be.”
The key to winning the battle of ideas on gun control, Byrne says, is resetting the terms of the debate. “Guns are primarily a public health hazard—now we have to start viewing, and treating, them as such,” he writes. “This is a public health issue just like the dangers posed by driving, smoking, vaccinations, obesity and poverty.”
He continues, “I think reframing the gun issue as a public health issue—as well as an issue of our right, and our freedom, to live without a constant threat of violence—is the way to go in convincing our lawmakers, and more crucially our neighbors and our nation, to act on this issue.”
Gun control advocates, Byrne writes, would be well-served to mirror the arguments that persuaded citizens and lawmakers to support government regulation of other public health matters, such as cigarettes, seat belts, and sugary drinks: “The benefits of regulation in these areas often outweighs the rights of individuals to impose risk on others—which is exactly what guns do.”
Despite the powerful influence of the NRA and the legislative failures of recent gun control proposals, Byrne writes that he maintains optimism about the prospects of change:
Slavery was once broadly accepted, and now no one believes that any more. In just my lifetime, we have almost entirely rejected the notion that black people are inferior—a ridiculous, even offensive, idea today. And most folks now believe that gay people should have the same rights as straight folks,she shift that has largely taken place in a matter of years. These are huge changes, and some of them were unimaginable not so very long ago. There is hope.
“The change needn’t be all top-down,” Byrne writes. “Small groups who engage individuals have an inordinate effect. Change happens as new views, new thoughts, and new opinions on an old issue accumulate.”