Helen H. Moore's Blog, page 966
October 29, 2015
We were not wired for scary things : Adventures in the spooky science of thrills, chills and Halloween fear
Walking through the gates at Fuji-Q, I instantly felt my heart rate increase. I heard the telltale click-click-click as the coasters climbed the track, the screams growing louder and then fading as riders twisted and turned through loops and inversions, and finally the ground-shaking thunder as they sped around through the web of rails. I immediately ran to the Takabisha and got in line. Usually waiting in line is filled with growing anticipation, and all around me I watched as friends and couples jumped up and down with excitement, struggling to control their nerves as they talked and laughed. Amusement parks are made for friends and family, and they prove the truth of the saying “A happiness shared is a happiness doubled.” Indeed, research from Arthur Aron and colleagues found that participants reported an increase in relationship quality after participating in something novel and exciting together. Recent research by Garriy Shteynberg at the University of Tennessee found through a series of social experiments that “simultaneous co-attention,” or participating in something with others, leads to a more intense emotional experience. He and his colleagues showed that scary advertisements felt scarier, negative images made people feel sadder, and happy images made people feel happier when people knew they weren’t experiencing them alone. We enjoy experiences with others not only because of our own emotional responses, but because when we watch someone experience something, we experience it ourselves—it’s how we empathize and connect to each other. Kyung Hwa Lee and Greg Siegle from the University of Pittsburgh conducted a meta-analysis of existing studies that used neuroimaging to measure emotional evaluation of the self and others. They found similar or overlapping patterns of brain activity when we experience an emotion and when we evaluate others’ emotions. For example, the part of our insular cortex (a brain structure located in the left and right hemispheres inside the cerebral cortex—more on that later) that processes pain is active when we experience pain ourselves and when we are simply observing something that causes pain, as in “I could feel my teeth hurt watching that dentist drill into her tooth!” This could be why you scream when your friend is startled and why you cry when you see your loved one cry. Of course seeing someone else do something, or even imagining doing something ourselves, is not exactly the same as experiencing it directly (as I would repeatedly learn). For example, we mostly only experience the affective part of the physical pain of others; we really don’t have the same intense physical sensations in our body. This means that you’ll suffer along with the character on screen trying to cut off his foot, but won’t be screaming in agony as though your foot really was being sawed from your leg (but it might ache a little). The mechanisms behind this process of creating overlapping layers of representation is still debated, but researchers like neuroscientist V. S. Ramachandran and Lindsay Oberman believe it is likely a result of mirror neurons, or what Ramachandran calls the discovery responsible for the great leap forward in human civilization. The mirror neuron was discovered by an Italian research team in the premotor cortex of macaques in 1992. They noticed that this new class of neurons was active not only when the monkey was carrying out a task but when it watched another monkey do the same thing. The media interpreted this as the discovery of the neurological basis of empathy, birthing a tornado of headlines claiming everything from the discovery of God in the brain to the human soul. But as cognitive neuroscientist and science writer Christian Jarrett pointed out in his critical article, “A Calm Look at the Most Hyped Concept in Neuroscience—Mirror Neurons,” the hype was largely just that: a chance to grab attention and headlines. Researchers James Kilner and Roger Lemon, through their careful review of research on the topic, show that there are more questions than answers about mirror neurons. They do work in the motor cortex and likely play a role in our ability to mimic expressions and gestures, but they are not the “soul” source of human empathy (pun intended). * Watching the faces light up around me, I found myself wishing I had someone to share this experience with. Just the night before, on the train to Mount Fuji, I had thought about how amazing it was to be so far away from everything and everyone. No one knew where I was; no one could reach me; no one expected anything from me. I felt free from all responsibilities, as if I had been given a hall pass in life. But as I stood in line, those same thoughts took on new meaning, and instead of smiling like those around me, I felt a wave of sadness. I was alone. All of a sudden I felt heavy and tired. I wanted to go sit in my room and stare at the wall. As my turn approached, the ride attendant walked over, held up one finger, and asked, “One?” Embarrassed at forcing the couples around me to separate, I nodded my head. Sharing a car with three strangers, I felt self-conscious and burdensome—not your typical emotional state before a roller coaster ride. I should have been sweating bullets and feeling anxious and exhilarated, as I had while riding coasters all day with my friends at Cedar Point. I tried to shake it off. Finally, after instructions in Japanese, English, and a few other languages, the car took off—accelerating to sixty-two miles per hour in only two seconds—and then dropped into total darkness. Instantly my whole body came alive, and before I knew it, I was screaming. * Humans have sophisticated systems of prediction, and when our predictions don’t match our experience, it raises a red flag and puts us in a state of uncertainty. Perhaps the most important are the systems that tell us what to expect from changes in gravitational force: namely, our vestibular system and our proprioception (or our awareness of our body in the space around us). Our brain brings together information from these systems to help us determine things like balance, acceleration, and direction. An incorrect prediction is profoundly disorienting at a visceral level—as when we mistakenly think there is one stair left going into the basement. Thrill rides mess with these well-designed internal systems, violating our expectations and thumbing their nose at the work of evolution. They take us to speeds we could never run, launch us in the air as though we could fly, take us around turns faster than we could ever survive on our own, and basically confuse the hell out of our bodies. There are very, very few ways we can achieve these sensations naturally—or without some sort of mechanical manipulation. Prior to the innovative and creative thrill rides of the twentieth century, the only ways to feel the sensations caused by acceleration and direction manipulation were accidental, to say the least: being swung back and forth in the mouth of a lion, for instance, or falling down a steep hill, neither of which bodes especially well for our survival. Yet today we’ve built machines that allow us to experience physical sensations our ancestors couldn’t even imagine, just to see what it feels like. The outcome—it can feel great, but it can also leave you begging for the comfort of your safe, warm bed or, worse, dead. Thanks in part to the research of a former US Air Force officer named John Stapp, we know that the body’s ability to tolerate changes in g-force (which is essentially the measure of gravity acting on your body: 1 g being normal, 3 g being the force you’d feel if you were three times as heavy) depends on time, direction, and rate of acceleration. You may be able to take a 100 g punch to the gut that’s over in a second, but the longer the duration, the smaller the g-force we can tolerate. Most people start to get uncomfortable past 5 g, which is when some of the real danger kicks in. During rapid changes in acceleration and direction, our blood pressure is significantly affected, which can cause everything from lightheadedness to a “gray-out,” where we lose some visual acuity, to blacking out and losing consciousness completely, or even dying. Over the course of Stapp’s experimental rides (he took several extreme ones in the name of science, peaking at 46 g), he experienced broken bones, a detached retina, burst blood vessels, and permanently impaired vision. Human beings were simply not designed for these unnatural experiences, which is why our body essentially freaks out. Moreover, everyone has different levels of tolerance. For some a Ferris wheel is enough to cause nausea, while others leave the 6.3 g Tower of Terror begging for more. The key for designers is to hit that sweet spot between 4 and 6 g with just the right path, height, speed, and time to trigger the sensations without giving us whiplash, making us sick, or putting us in real danger. * These are the sensations that people talk about the most when they discuss thrill rides: the “dizzy feeling,” the “airtime” or “weightlessness,” and the “stomach drop.” The rides best known for the “dizzy feeling” are the antigravity spinners that confuse our bodies by upsetting our semicircular canal system (part of the vestibular system, it is the intricate and sensitive labyrinth of canals that comprise our inner ear), which is responsible for reporting on our rotational movement. And of course our visual cues are completely disrupted (it’s hard to focus when you’re spinning). A lot of people really love the dizzy feeling—especially kids who are just beginning to understand how their bodies work. For them it’s novel at this time of self-discovery. Who doesn’t remember spinning as a child until collapsing on the grass, giggling as the sky spun above you? As we age, however, so does our vestibular system, making it harder to find our balance and thus making that dizzy feeling not so much fun anymore. The loss of control and disorientation can also be hard to tolerate in adulthood. You have to choose to relax and embrace the dizziness, and then maybe you can recapture some of that childhood delight. I don’t hate spinning rides, but the residual feeling of dizziness leaves me feeling unsteady and drunk for a half hour afterwards—it’s sometimes just impractical. Turns out that I and those who have poor postural control or balance are more sensitive to dizziness—as I would be reminded more than once during my adventures. I felt this intensely after riding the Eejanaika, which has over fourteen inversions and rotating seats—after that I wasn’t sure which way was up for a good five minutes. Next, there is my favorite thrill ride sensation: the feeling of weightlessness. This happens in those brief but treasured seconds when a ride tips over the apex of a steep hill or begins its decent back down to the ground. In that second we feel weightless—though we’re not, of course, since zero g-force is different from zero gravity. On Earth gravity is constant, so it’s only through manipulating downward acceleration that we can approximate the feeling of zero gravity. Thrill rides give us a few seconds at best. The Zero G: Weightless Experience Flight gives you a total of 7.5 minutes (in 30-second intervals) for “just” five thousand dollars. Right before and after the far too fleeting feeling of weightlessness, we experience what everyone calls the “stomach drop” sensation. This is not really a metaphor—it’s the literal feeling of gravity acting on your stomach, which sits loosely inside your body. When you are accelerating toward the ground faster than 1 g—for example, when you are dropped 415 feet at 90 miles per hour from the Zumanjaro: Drop of Doom at Six Flags Great Adventure—your stomach is going to feel as if it’s in your chest (another common description). When you’re being launched forward at 106.9 miles per hour in 1.8 seconds, as on the Dodonpa, it’s going to feel as if you left your stomach at the station. The Dodonpa is especially cruel to our systems of prediction and balance, as I learned later that day. There, I waited in the car as the loudspeaker began the countdown, and with each beat my body tensed up, preparing for takeoff. Finally the clock reached zero. Only, nothing happened except for me lurching forward in anticipation. The designers wisely built in a “false start” and an “accidental start,” leaving me feeling as if I just threw open a door I thought would weigh a hundred pounds but was instead light as a feather. Since gravity is acting on us all the time, our bodies are calibrated to expect to be constantly pulled to the earth at a steady rate. When that rate is radically adjusted, or not what we predicted or prepared for, our system gets confused and sounds the alarm. Getting on a ride that shoots you straight up literally results in your insides “dropping” to the floor, or at least as low as they can get. This leaves you feeling all kinds of sensations, some caused by a drop in blood pressure, but mostly because of the signals being sent to your brain via the vagus nerve. The vagus nerve is a mixed bundle of both afferent nerves (they send messages to the brain) and efferent nerves (they receive messages from the brain) that stretch from your brain all the way to the bottom of your stomach, or lower viscera. The vagus nerve plays a big role in our threat response: it’s an umbrella of nerves that alert us that something is wrong by collecting information—for example, the fact that your organs are “floating” around inside your torso, which they are if you’re riding the Drop of Doom—and sending the messages to the brain’s limbic region, where you process threat. Researchers in Zurich have also found that it plays a central role in our responses to innate fears; when a rat’s vagus nerve is severed, it exhibits a lower level of fear of open spaces and bright lights. The human equivalent of this might be a lack of fear while standing right on the edge of the Grand Canyon. The vagus nerve also works with the parasympathetic system (the rest and digest part of the autonomic nervous system) to lower heart rate and blood pressure. In fact, it also signals changes in the neurotransmitters responsible for making us feel better. (Neurotransmitters are chemicals stored inside of neurons, which process and transmit information in our brain through chemical and electronic signals; different stimuli trigger different neurotransmitter responses.) In fact, current research shows that vagus nerve stimulation through an implant that delivers electric pulses may be an effective intervention for people with treatment-resistant depression. Needless to say, if electric stimulation of the vagus nerve through a surgical implant can help those with depression, just imagine what a roller coaster ride can do for the masses. No wonder people are standing in line four hours for a two-minute thrill. Not everyone likes these sensations. For example, those who fear flying relate these sensations to the anxiety-inducing feelings that occur during takeoff. For others, the intense g-force can feel like a panic attack, which I can empathize with. It feels the same because it essentially is the same physiologically: panic attacks involve the same systems and symptoms of the threat response—sweating, heart racing, chest pounding, dizziness, and basically feeling you’re going to die. It makes sense that someone who has only experienced these sensations in the context of a panic attack wouldn’t like them. Lucky for me, I was riding roller coasters long before I started waking up at three in the morning feeling as if I were being crushed by an invisible anvil. For me, the crushing weight and my racing heart while climbing to the top of a 141-foot hill inside a small car attached to an elaborate metal beast signal not panic but relief. I know that as soon as the car tips over the apex, I’ll feel as if I’m flying, weightless and wonderful. This is just one reason I love thrill rides (we also release dopamine, the “feel good” neurotransmitter, in anticipation of doing something rewarding); I never know how long a panic attack will last, but I know when I get on a roller coaster, in two minutes I’ll return to the station, feet flat on the ground, feeling good and liberated. * My screaming came to an abrupt halt after the Takabisha looped through an “inverted top hat” and over two “airtime” hills and slowed to a crawl around a 180-degree corner. I gasped as I saw the track take a 90-degree turn straight up. As the car latched into place, the chain lift began its click-click-click, and soon I was perpendicular to the ground and beginning the upward climb. Fastened tightly into my seat with my back to the ground, I felt heavy and unmovable, like a sack of potatoes (gravity works on our organs separately—we can’t feel our organs the way we can our skin, but our nerves pick up different, loose sensations inside of us). The car was silent except for the click-click of the chain lift. Gazing up into the open sky in front of me, I felt the whole world drop away, and I was ready for liftoff. The anticipation was excruciating as the car slowly climbed the steep hill to the top—where it paused. And the view was incredible: Mount Fuji in the distance against a clear sky, looking back at me with royal wisdom. But that moment didn’t last long. My attention was quickly diverted back to the disappearing track in front of me. Because the angle is 121 degrees, you cannot see the track as it curves back against itself. This is terrifying; it looks as though the car will unlatch from the track and go plummeting to the ground, scattering its passengers into the air like the sacks of potatoes we were. As the car inched forward over the peak, my legs started shaking uncontrollably, and I kept repeating, “Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God.” Suspended in midair, 141 feet high, I could feel every muscle in my body wrap forcefully around my bones as I braced against the restraints, preparing for the eventual drop. Even my teeth were clenched. I forced my tightly curled fists over my head and extended my arms as far as I could (it really does make it more intense!). Finally, the car tipped over the apex and dove toward the ground. I started screaming louder than I ever have before, as tears streamed down my face. Adapted from "SCREAM: Chilling Adventures in the Science of Fear" by Margee Kerr. Reprinted with permission from PublicAffairs. All rights reserved.
NBA player details horrific assault by NYPD: “It was an act of police brutality, and I believe it could happen to anyone”
In an exclusive piece for GQ, Atlanta Hawks wingman Thabo Sefolosha details, for the first time, the horrific assault he suffered at the hands of NYPD officers on April 8, 2015, that resulted in the NBA star breaking his leg and missing the playoffs. The basics are this: On April 8, Bucks player Chris Copeland was stabbed outside New York’s 1OAK club in an unrelated incident. In the ensuing aftermath, NYPD officers, seemingly without cause, forced Sefolosha to the ground and broke his leg. The cops charged him with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and obstruction of governmental administration. Sefolosha was fully exonerated of all charges on October 9. A few days later, he revealed he planned to sue the NYPD and New York City for $50 million, relating to injuries inflicted by police that night. Now he has opened up about the precise details of the assault for the first time. In the GQ piece, Sefolosha explains that police officers hustled him and others out of the club after the stabbing occurred, and acknowledges that he did engage in some verbal sparring with one officer, calling him a “midget" after the officer told him "without a badge, I can fuck you up." He also explains that he felt singled out by officers for no reason. Sefolosha says he tried to get into a livery cab to escape the chaos outside the club, but stopped briefly to give money to a homeless man. It was at this point that police attacked him. A video acquired by TMZ appears to corroborate Sefolosha’s claims. Here's how he explains it:
When I made a few steps toward the guy, an officer said, "You're going to jail." Pero [Antic, another Hawks player] tapped the officer on the shoulder and said, "Relax, he didn't do anything." Another officer pushed him in the chest and he fell. That's what the first YouTube video showed—him on the floor. More officers started grabbing me. I was trying to put the money back in my pocket. Usually I don't carry that much, but I had six or seven hundred dollars in my hand. One officer pulled me from my right arm, another grabbed me on my left, and another grabbed me on the back of my neck. I'm in, like, an on-a-cross type of position. I couldn't even move. It was just chaos. I had never been arrested before. I understood a little bit late that they were trying to put me on the ground, but if somebody grabs your arms and pulls you on your neck, you fall face first. Somebody kicked my leg, more than once, from the back to force me to the ground. I knew something had happened as soon as they did it; I'm an athlete, so I know how my body should feel. They were stepping on my foot, too, I guess to try to keep me there. I didn't feel like there was anything I could do to calm it down. I tried to show them I was cooperating. I tried.Ultimately, Sefolosha discovered that his leg was broken and his ligaments were torn, thus forcing him to sit out the playoffs. Sefolosha goes on to detail the legal battle that ensued, and his exoneration — largely as a result of the TMZ video and other videos his lawyers managed to find — and the emotional distress that occurred. Explaining that hhe felt "defeated and angry that all this had happened, and for no reason," Sefolosha says he lost 15 pounds from the stress of the trial and didn’t get more than six hours of sleep for the month leading up to his trial. Despite Sefolosha saying he doesn’t want to “make it a racial thing,” it’s hard to ignore the parallels between this incident and the many other instances of unprovoked police violence suffered by African Americans on a daily basis. “My wife and dad were outraged and in disbelief,” Sefolosha writes. “He’s from South Africa; he was in a band that was really active in denouncing the old apartheid movement. To think of this happening to his son in the streets of New York City in 2015—and I don't really want to make it as a racial thing. I want to let people make up their own minds.” Sefolosha concludes by saying he feels he was a victim of police brutality.
It was an act of police brutality, and I believe it could happen to anyone. Now I'm a lot more aware of everything that goes on. I've been, I don't want to say disillusioned, but brought back to earth in a harsh way. I look at videos of police brutality on YouTube or CNN.com. The other day I was watching this woman getting punched by the police for recording them arresting her husband. In a situation like this, you are helpless. If there's six people jumping me outside of the club, I scream, "Police, police!" If the police are doing this to me, who you want me to turn to?We suggest you read the full, harrowing account over at GQ.In an exclusive piece for GQ, Atlanta Hawks wingman Thabo Sefolosha details, for the first time, the horrific assault he suffered at the hands of NYPD officers on April 8, 2015, that resulted in the NBA star breaking his leg and missing the playoffs. The basics are this: On April 8, Bucks player Chris Copeland was stabbed outside New York’s 1OAK club in an unrelated incident. In the ensuing aftermath, NYPD officers, seemingly without cause, forced Sefolosha to the ground and broke his leg. The cops charged him with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and obstruction of governmental administration. Sefolosha was fully exonerated of all charges on October 9. A few days later, he revealed he planned to sue the NYPD and New York City for $50 million, relating to injuries inflicted by police that night. Now he has opened up about the precise details of the assault for the first time. In the GQ piece, Sefolosha explains that police officers hustled him and others out of the club after the stabbing occurred, and acknowledges that he did engage in some verbal sparring with one officer, calling him a “midget" after the officer told him "without a badge, I can fuck you up." He also explains that he felt singled out by officers for no reason. Sefolosha says he tried to get into a livery cab to escape the chaos outside the club, but stopped briefly to give money to a homeless man. It was at this point that police attacked him. A video acquired by TMZ appears to corroborate Sefolosha’s claims. Here's how he explains it:
When I made a few steps toward the guy, an officer said, "You're going to jail." Pero [Antic, another Hawks player] tapped the officer on the shoulder and said, "Relax, he didn't do anything." Another officer pushed him in the chest and he fell. That's what the first YouTube video showed—him on the floor. More officers started grabbing me. I was trying to put the money back in my pocket. Usually I don't carry that much, but I had six or seven hundred dollars in my hand. One officer pulled me from my right arm, another grabbed me on my left, and another grabbed me on the back of my neck. I'm in, like, an on-a-cross type of position. I couldn't even move. It was just chaos. I had never been arrested before. I understood a little bit late that they were trying to put me on the ground, but if somebody grabs your arms and pulls you on your neck, you fall face first. Somebody kicked my leg, more than once, from the back to force me to the ground. I knew something had happened as soon as they did it; I'm an athlete, so I know how my body should feel. They were stepping on my foot, too, I guess to try to keep me there. I didn't feel like there was anything I could do to calm it down. I tried to show them I was cooperating. I tried.Ultimately, Sefolosha discovered that his leg was broken and his ligaments were torn, thus forcing him to sit out the playoffs. Sefolosha goes on to detail the legal battle that ensued, and his exoneration — largely as a result of the TMZ video and other videos his lawyers managed to find — and the emotional distress that occurred. Explaining that hhe felt "defeated and angry that all this had happened, and for no reason," Sefolosha says he lost 15 pounds from the stress of the trial and didn’t get more than six hours of sleep for the month leading up to his trial. Despite Sefolosha saying he doesn’t want to “make it a racial thing,” it’s hard to ignore the parallels between this incident and the many other instances of unprovoked police violence suffered by African Americans on a daily basis. “My wife and dad were outraged and in disbelief,” Sefolosha writes. “He’s from South Africa; he was in a band that was really active in denouncing the old apartheid movement. To think of this happening to his son in the streets of New York City in 2015—and I don't really want to make it as a racial thing. I want to let people make up their own minds.” Sefolosha concludes by saying he feels he was a victim of police brutality.
It was an act of police brutality, and I believe it could happen to anyone. Now I'm a lot more aware of everything that goes on. I've been, I don't want to say disillusioned, but brought back to earth in a harsh way. I look at videos of police brutality on YouTube or CNN.com. The other day I was watching this woman getting punched by the police for recording them arresting her husband. In a situation like this, you are helpless. If there's six people jumping me outside of the club, I scream, "Police, police!" If the police are doing this to me, who you want me to turn to?We suggest you read the full, harrowing account over at GQ.In an exclusive piece for GQ, Atlanta Hawks wingman Thabo Sefolosha details, for the first time, the horrific assault he suffered at the hands of NYPD officers on April 8, 2015, that resulted in the NBA star breaking his leg and missing the playoffs. The basics are this: On April 8, Bucks player Chris Copeland was stabbed outside New York’s 1OAK club in an unrelated incident. In the ensuing aftermath, NYPD officers, seemingly without cause, forced Sefolosha to the ground and broke his leg. The cops charged him with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and obstruction of governmental administration. Sefolosha was fully exonerated of all charges on October 9. A few days later, he revealed he planned to sue the NYPD and New York City for $50 million, relating to injuries inflicted by police that night. Now he has opened up about the precise details of the assault for the first time. In the GQ piece, Sefolosha explains that police officers hustled him and others out of the club after the stabbing occurred, and acknowledges that he did engage in some verbal sparring with one officer, calling him a “midget" after the officer told him "without a badge, I can fuck you up." He also explains that he felt singled out by officers for no reason. Sefolosha says he tried to get into a livery cab to escape the chaos outside the club, but stopped briefly to give money to a homeless man. It was at this point that police attacked him. A video acquired by TMZ appears to corroborate Sefolosha’s claims. Here's how he explains it:
When I made a few steps toward the guy, an officer said, "You're going to jail." Pero [Antic, another Hawks player] tapped the officer on the shoulder and said, "Relax, he didn't do anything." Another officer pushed him in the chest and he fell. That's what the first YouTube video showed—him on the floor. More officers started grabbing me. I was trying to put the money back in my pocket. Usually I don't carry that much, but I had six or seven hundred dollars in my hand. One officer pulled me from my right arm, another grabbed me on my left, and another grabbed me on the back of my neck. I'm in, like, an on-a-cross type of position. I couldn't even move. It was just chaos. I had never been arrested before. I understood a little bit late that they were trying to put me on the ground, but if somebody grabs your arms and pulls you on your neck, you fall face first. Somebody kicked my leg, more than once, from the back to force me to the ground. I knew something had happened as soon as they did it; I'm an athlete, so I know how my body should feel. They were stepping on my foot, too, I guess to try to keep me there. I didn't feel like there was anything I could do to calm it down. I tried to show them I was cooperating. I tried.Ultimately, Sefolosha discovered that his leg was broken and his ligaments were torn, thus forcing him to sit out the playoffs. Sefolosha goes on to detail the legal battle that ensued, and his exoneration — largely as a result of the TMZ video and other videos his lawyers managed to find — and the emotional distress that occurred. Explaining that hhe felt "defeated and angry that all this had happened, and for no reason," Sefolosha says he lost 15 pounds from the stress of the trial and didn’t get more than six hours of sleep for the month leading up to his trial. Despite Sefolosha saying he doesn’t want to “make it a racial thing,” it’s hard to ignore the parallels between this incident and the many other instances of unprovoked police violence suffered by African Americans on a daily basis. “My wife and dad were outraged and in disbelief,” Sefolosha writes. “He’s from South Africa; he was in a band that was really active in denouncing the old apartheid movement. To think of this happening to his son in the streets of New York City in 2015—and I don't really want to make it as a racial thing. I want to let people make up their own minds.” Sefolosha concludes by saying he feels he was a victim of police brutality.
It was an act of police brutality, and I believe it could happen to anyone. Now I'm a lot more aware of everything that goes on. I've been, I don't want to say disillusioned, but brought back to earth in a harsh way. I look at videos of police brutality on YouTube or CNN.com. The other day I was watching this woman getting punched by the police for recording them arresting her husband. In a situation like this, you are helpless. If there's six people jumping me outside of the club, I scream, "Police, police!" If the police are doing this to me, who you want me to turn to?We suggest you read the full, harrowing account over at GQ.In an exclusive piece for GQ, Atlanta Hawks wingman Thabo Sefolosha details, for the first time, the horrific assault he suffered at the hands of NYPD officers on April 8, 2015, that resulted in the NBA star breaking his leg and missing the playoffs. The basics are this: On April 8, Bucks player Chris Copeland was stabbed outside New York’s 1OAK club in an unrelated incident. In the ensuing aftermath, NYPD officers, seemingly without cause, forced Sefolosha to the ground and broke his leg. The cops charged him with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and obstruction of governmental administration. Sefolosha was fully exonerated of all charges on October 9. A few days later, he revealed he planned to sue the NYPD and New York City for $50 million, relating to injuries inflicted by police that night. Now he has opened up about the precise details of the assault for the first time. In the GQ piece, Sefolosha explains that police officers hustled him and others out of the club after the stabbing occurred, and acknowledges that he did engage in some verbal sparring with one officer, calling him a “midget" after the officer told him "without a badge, I can fuck you up." He also explains that he felt singled out by officers for no reason. Sefolosha says he tried to get into a livery cab to escape the chaos outside the club, but stopped briefly to give money to a homeless man. It was at this point that police attacked him. A video acquired by TMZ appears to corroborate Sefolosha’s claims. Here's how he explains it:
When I made a few steps toward the guy, an officer said, "You're going to jail." Pero [Antic, another Hawks player] tapped the officer on the shoulder and said, "Relax, he didn't do anything." Another officer pushed him in the chest and he fell. That's what the first YouTube video showed—him on the floor. More officers started grabbing me. I was trying to put the money back in my pocket. Usually I don't carry that much, but I had six or seven hundred dollars in my hand. One officer pulled me from my right arm, another grabbed me on my left, and another grabbed me on the back of my neck. I'm in, like, an on-a-cross type of position. I couldn't even move. It was just chaos. I had never been arrested before. I understood a little bit late that they were trying to put me on the ground, but if somebody grabs your arms and pulls you on your neck, you fall face first. Somebody kicked my leg, more than once, from the back to force me to the ground. I knew something had happened as soon as they did it; I'm an athlete, so I know how my body should feel. They were stepping on my foot, too, I guess to try to keep me there. I didn't feel like there was anything I could do to calm it down. I tried to show them I was cooperating. I tried.Ultimately, Sefolosha discovered that his leg was broken and his ligaments were torn, thus forcing him to sit out the playoffs. Sefolosha goes on to detail the legal battle that ensued, and his exoneration — largely as a result of the TMZ video and other videos his lawyers managed to find — and the emotional distress that occurred. Explaining that hhe felt "defeated and angry that all this had happened, and for no reason," Sefolosha says he lost 15 pounds from the stress of the trial and didn’t get more than six hours of sleep for the month leading up to his trial. Despite Sefolosha saying he doesn’t want to “make it a racial thing,” it’s hard to ignore the parallels between this incident and the many other instances of unprovoked police violence suffered by African Americans on a daily basis. “My wife and dad were outraged and in disbelief,” Sefolosha writes. “He’s from South Africa; he was in a band that was really active in denouncing the old apartheid movement. To think of this happening to his son in the streets of New York City in 2015—and I don't really want to make it as a racial thing. I want to let people make up their own minds.” Sefolosha concludes by saying he feels he was a victim of police brutality.
It was an act of police brutality, and I believe it could happen to anyone. Now I'm a lot more aware of everything that goes on. I've been, I don't want to say disillusioned, but brought back to earth in a harsh way. I look at videos of police brutality on YouTube or CNN.com. The other day I was watching this woman getting punched by the police for recording them arresting her husband. In a situation like this, you are helpless. If there's six people jumping me outside of the club, I scream, "Police, police!" If the police are doing this to me, who you want me to turn to?We suggest you read the full, harrowing account over at GQ.In an exclusive piece for GQ, Atlanta Hawks wingman Thabo Sefolosha details, for the first time, the horrific assault he suffered at the hands of NYPD officers on April 8, 2015, that resulted in the NBA star breaking his leg and missing the playoffs. The basics are this: On April 8, Bucks player Chris Copeland was stabbed outside New York’s 1OAK club in an unrelated incident. In the ensuing aftermath, NYPD officers, seemingly without cause, forced Sefolosha to the ground and broke his leg. The cops charged him with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and obstruction of governmental administration. Sefolosha was fully exonerated of all charges on October 9. A few days later, he revealed he planned to sue the NYPD and New York City for $50 million, relating to injuries inflicted by police that night. Now he has opened up about the precise details of the assault for the first time. In the GQ piece, Sefolosha explains that police officers hustled him and others out of the club after the stabbing occurred, and acknowledges that he did engage in some verbal sparring with one officer, calling him a “midget" after the officer told him "without a badge, I can fuck you up." He also explains that he felt singled out by officers for no reason. Sefolosha says he tried to get into a livery cab to escape the chaos outside the club, but stopped briefly to give money to a homeless man. It was at this point that police attacked him. A video acquired by TMZ appears to corroborate Sefolosha’s claims. Here's how he explains it:
When I made a few steps toward the guy, an officer said, "You're going to jail." Pero [Antic, another Hawks player] tapped the officer on the shoulder and said, "Relax, he didn't do anything." Another officer pushed him in the chest and he fell. That's what the first YouTube video showed—him on the floor. More officers started grabbing me. I was trying to put the money back in my pocket. Usually I don't carry that much, but I had six or seven hundred dollars in my hand. One officer pulled me from my right arm, another grabbed me on my left, and another grabbed me on the back of my neck. I'm in, like, an on-a-cross type of position. I couldn't even move. It was just chaos. I had never been arrested before. I understood a little bit late that they were trying to put me on the ground, but if somebody grabs your arms and pulls you on your neck, you fall face first. Somebody kicked my leg, more than once, from the back to force me to the ground. I knew something had happened as soon as they did it; I'm an athlete, so I know how my body should feel. They were stepping on my foot, too, I guess to try to keep me there. I didn't feel like there was anything I could do to calm it down. I tried to show them I was cooperating. I tried.Ultimately, Sefolosha discovered that his leg was broken and his ligaments were torn, thus forcing him to sit out the playoffs. Sefolosha goes on to detail the legal battle that ensued, and his exoneration — largely as a result of the TMZ video and other videos his lawyers managed to find — and the emotional distress that occurred. Explaining that hhe felt "defeated and angry that all this had happened, and for no reason," Sefolosha says he lost 15 pounds from the stress of the trial and didn’t get more than six hours of sleep for the month leading up to his trial. Despite Sefolosha saying he doesn’t want to “make it a racial thing,” it’s hard to ignore the parallels between this incident and the many other instances of unprovoked police violence suffered by African Americans on a daily basis. “My wife and dad were outraged and in disbelief,” Sefolosha writes. “He’s from South Africa; he was in a band that was really active in denouncing the old apartheid movement. To think of this happening to his son in the streets of New York City in 2015—and I don't really want to make it as a racial thing. I want to let people make up their own minds.” Sefolosha concludes by saying he feels he was a victim of police brutality.
It was an act of police brutality, and I believe it could happen to anyone. Now I'm a lot more aware of everything that goes on. I've been, I don't want to say disillusioned, but brought back to earth in a harsh way. I look at videos of police brutality on YouTube or CNN.com. The other day I was watching this woman getting punched by the police for recording them arresting her husband. In a situation like this, you are helpless. If there's six people jumping me outside of the club, I scream, "Police, police!" If the police are doing this to me, who you want me to turn to?We suggest you read the full, harrowing account over at GQ.
Jeb Bush’s stunning, televised implosion: How the former GOP frontrunner became a sad, pathetic joke
“He needed a moment to assuage donor fears and it backfired. As much as people may say the Bush name is a hindrance, the reality is that his last name is the only thing keeping him in the conversation right now.” -- A South Carolina Republican operative Ouch. That pretty much sums up all the reviews of Jeb Bush's performance in last night's CNBC debate. What was billed as a make-or-break night for him didn't turn out very well. He appeared listless and dull on stage and afterwards snapped at a reporter who asked him what he thought of his performance saying: “It’s not a performance. I’m running for president of the United States.” It was not the night he needed to stem the bleeding of his wounded campaign. He'll almost certainly trudge on for a while, but it's clear his heart is not in it anymore, if it ever was. Donald Trump and Ben Carson both did what they had to do -- they delivered for their followers. Trump bragged a bit and called the moderators nasty; Carson smiled and gibbered incoherently and the status quo was maintained. As much as the media wanted them to melt down on stage, it didn't happen. In fact, both of them are actually improving as candidates and debaters, which is rather chilling. John Kasich and Chris Christie both tried to be the "voices of reason" and ended up sounding like dads who are always mad. Christie's pitch all night was as the dude who was eager for an opportunity to smack the uppity Hillary Clinton: "You put me on the stage with her next September and she won't get within 10 miles of the White House." Kasich tried to attack the crazies and just sounded like one himself. Carly Fiorina, meanwhile, lectured pedantically in her trademark staccato style, while Rand Paul blathered about the Fed and Mike Huckabee reiterated his ingenious plan to cure all diseases so we won't need health care anymore. Other than that, they didn't really register. I wrote yesterday about the potential for a Marco Rubio vs Ted Cruz cage match and I think that was shown to good effect. As Washington Post reporter Robert Costa observed, "Cruz continues to run in his own lane on the party’s right." Trump fan Laura Ingraham tweeted, "None of the other candidates attack the GOP elites like @tedcruz. He's right--they meet behind closed doors on how to attack Republicans." There is no higher praise among the righties. Cruz remains the best positioned to seize the outsider mantle should the real outsiders fade. Rubio, on the other hand, went after Bush hard and attacked Clinton with a metaphorical meat ax; he was the only one to bring up the Benghazi hearings and it got huge cheers from the audience. He was better than he's ever been -- confident, articulate and aggressive. The rivalry between these two youthful conservative powerhouses has begun. I still suspect this may be where we end up. Both of these guys are pretty good politicians. In a year when the circus wasn't in town, they would be the frontrunners. But for all that, the big loser last night wasn't any of the candidates. According to the shrieking malcontents in the GOP, led by Ted Cruz, it was that notorious "liberal media" outfit CNBC. That's right, the big-moneyed Wall Street fan club that features the likes of Rick "Tea Party" Santelli and Lawrence Kudlow is nothing more than a mouthpiece for the socialist Democratic party. Who knew? There was plenty to criticize about the CNBC punditry before the debate. Their casual commentary was painfully soporific and politically obtuse, undoubtedly helping the TV audience gain new appreciation for the deep insights of Don Lemon and Gretchen Carlson. But the moderators' questions and adversarial attitude were thoroughly appropriate. They were very pointed in their questions, calling the candidates on past comments and pressing them to explain themselves. The candidates, the party and the right wing media did not like it one bit. Bush's campaign manager complained to CNBC's producer about the amount of time his candidate was allotted. Fox's Bill O'Reilly claimed that he understood the "culture over there" and he was quite sure those moderators were getting a lot of "attaboys" from management. GOP operative Richard Grenell tweeted that "it's obvious that MSNBC has influenced CNBC" and Fox's Steve Doocy wondered if "the CNBC moderators cut off Mrs Clinton the way they're rudely interrupting the GOP candidates." They were all very, very upset. https://twitter.com/toddstarnes/statu... A fit to be tied Brent Bozell of the conservative Media Research Center said:
“The CNBC moderators acted less like journalists and more like Clinton campaign operatives. What was supposed to be a serious debate about the many issues plaguing our economy was given up for one Democratic talking point after another served up by the so-call ‘moderators.’”Even Reagan's Attorney General Ed Meese got in on the act calling the debate a "shooting gallery" set up by CNBC's "biased antagonists." But no one was more overwrought about all those left-wing liberals at CNBC than Republican Party Chairman Reince Preibus, who said, "I think it was one gotcha question, one personal low blow after the other. It’s almost like they tried to design a Rubik’s cube for every question,” before leaving the spin room in a huff. He then issued a scathing indictment of the network in a prepared statement.
"While I was proud of our candidates and the way they handled tonight’s debate, the performance by the CNBC moderators was extremely disappointing and did a disservice to their network, our candidates, and voters. Our diverse field of talented and exceptionally qualified candidates did their best to share ideas for how to reinvigorate the economy and put Americans back to work despite deeply unfortunate questioning from CNBC. "One of the great things about our party is that we are able to have a dynamic exchange about which solutions will secure a prosperous future, and I will fight to ensure future debates allow for a more robust exchange. CNBC should be ashamed of how this debate was handled.”CNBC, for its part, blandly replied that "people who want to be President of the United States should be able to answer tough questions." And indeed they should. They should also be able to assert themselves to claim more time if they have something to say. And they should not whine about the green room they were given or pout that a journalist isn't kissing their ring. Being president is a hard job. The whole party having a tantrum over a debate conducted by a conservative media organization is kind of pathetic and says a lot more about them than it does about the reporters. But there is an upside to this whole unpleasant episode for these very delicate Republicans. It brought them together. Rand Paul even got all warm and fuzzy about the whole thing saying, "One thing that unified all the Republicans tonight was the disdain for the moderators. I felt like we were all together in thinking that maybe the moderators got kind of carried away." Nothing creates Republicans solidarity like their bedrock belief that they are victims of the "liberal media." That they are convinced even the financial network CNBC, which fetishizes tax cuts and unfettered free markets, is now among their hated enemies may say more about where the Republican Party is today than anything those candidates said in the debate. They don't know who they are anymore.“He needed a moment to assuage donor fears and it backfired. As much as people may say the Bush name is a hindrance, the reality is that his last name is the only thing keeping him in the conversation right now.” -- A South Carolina Republican operative Ouch. That pretty much sums up all the reviews of Jeb Bush's performance in last night's CNBC debate. What was billed as a make-or-break night for him didn't turn out very well. He appeared listless and dull on stage and afterwards snapped at a reporter who asked him what he thought of his performance saying: “It’s not a performance. I’m running for president of the United States.” It was not the night he needed to stem the bleeding of his wounded campaign. He'll almost certainly trudge on for a while, but it's clear his heart is not in it anymore, if it ever was. Donald Trump and Ben Carson both did what they had to do -- they delivered for their followers. Trump bragged a bit and called the moderators nasty; Carson smiled and gibbered incoherently and the status quo was maintained. As much as the media wanted them to melt down on stage, it didn't happen. In fact, both of them are actually improving as candidates and debaters, which is rather chilling. John Kasich and Chris Christie both tried to be the "voices of reason" and ended up sounding like dads who are always mad. Christie's pitch all night was as the dude who was eager for an opportunity to smack the uppity Hillary Clinton: "You put me on the stage with her next September and she won't get within 10 miles of the White House." Kasich tried to attack the crazies and just sounded like one himself. Carly Fiorina, meanwhile, lectured pedantically in her trademark staccato style, while Rand Paul blathered about the Fed and Mike Huckabee reiterated his ingenious plan to cure all diseases so we won't need health care anymore. Other than that, they didn't really register. I wrote yesterday about the potential for a Marco Rubio vs Ted Cruz cage match and I think that was shown to good effect. As Washington Post reporter Robert Costa observed, "Cruz continues to run in his own lane on the party’s right." Trump fan Laura Ingraham tweeted, "None of the other candidates attack the GOP elites like @tedcruz. He's right--they meet behind closed doors on how to attack Republicans." There is no higher praise among the righties. Cruz remains the best positioned to seize the outsider mantle should the real outsiders fade. Rubio, on the other hand, went after Bush hard and attacked Clinton with a metaphorical meat ax; he was the only one to bring up the Benghazi hearings and it got huge cheers from the audience. He was better than he's ever been -- confident, articulate and aggressive. The rivalry between these two youthful conservative powerhouses has begun. I still suspect this may be where we end up. Both of these guys are pretty good politicians. In a year when the circus wasn't in town, they would be the frontrunners. But for all that, the big loser last night wasn't any of the candidates. According to the shrieking malcontents in the GOP, led by Ted Cruz, it was that notorious "liberal media" outfit CNBC. That's right, the big-moneyed Wall Street fan club that features the likes of Rick "Tea Party" Santelli and Lawrence Kudlow is nothing more than a mouthpiece for the socialist Democratic party. Who knew? There was plenty to criticize about the CNBC punditry before the debate. Their casual commentary was painfully soporific and politically obtuse, undoubtedly helping the TV audience gain new appreciation for the deep insights of Don Lemon and Gretchen Carlson. But the moderators' questions and adversarial attitude were thoroughly appropriate. They were very pointed in their questions, calling the candidates on past comments and pressing them to explain themselves. The candidates, the party and the right wing media did not like it one bit. Bush's campaign manager complained to CNBC's producer about the amount of time his candidate was allotted. Fox's Bill O'Reilly claimed that he understood the "culture over there" and he was quite sure those moderators were getting a lot of "attaboys" from management. GOP operative Richard Grenell tweeted that "it's obvious that MSNBC has influenced CNBC" and Fox's Steve Doocy wondered if "the CNBC moderators cut off Mrs Clinton the way they're rudely interrupting the GOP candidates." They were all very, very upset. https://twitter.com/toddstarnes/statu... A fit to be tied Brent Bozell of the conservative Media Research Center said:
“The CNBC moderators acted less like journalists and more like Clinton campaign operatives. What was supposed to be a serious debate about the many issues plaguing our economy was given up for one Democratic talking point after another served up by the so-call ‘moderators.’”Even Reagan's Attorney General Ed Meese got in on the act calling the debate a "shooting gallery" set up by CNBC's "biased antagonists." But no one was more overwrought about all those left-wing liberals at CNBC than Republican Party Chairman Reince Preibus, who said, "I think it was one gotcha question, one personal low blow after the other. It’s almost like they tried to design a Rubik’s cube for every question,” before leaving the spin room in a huff. He then issued a scathing indictment of the network in a prepared statement.
"While I was proud of our candidates and the way they handled tonight’s debate, the performance by the CNBC moderators was extremely disappointing and did a disservice to their network, our candidates, and voters. Our diverse field of talented and exceptionally qualified candidates did their best to share ideas for how to reinvigorate the economy and put Americans back to work despite deeply unfortunate questioning from CNBC. "One of the great things about our party is that we are able to have a dynamic exchange about which solutions will secure a prosperous future, and I will fight to ensure future debates allow for a more robust exchange. CNBC should be ashamed of how this debate was handled.”CNBC, for its part, blandly replied that "people who want to be President of the United States should be able to answer tough questions." And indeed they should. They should also be able to assert themselves to claim more time if they have something to say. And they should not whine about the green room they were given or pout that a journalist isn't kissing their ring. Being president is a hard job. The whole party having a tantrum over a debate conducted by a conservative media organization is kind of pathetic and says a lot more about them than it does about the reporters. But there is an upside to this whole unpleasant episode for these very delicate Republicans. It brought them together. Rand Paul even got all warm and fuzzy about the whole thing saying, "One thing that unified all the Republicans tonight was the disdain for the moderators. I felt like we were all together in thinking that maybe the moderators got kind of carried away." Nothing creates Republicans solidarity like their bedrock belief that they are victims of the "liberal media." That they are convinced even the financial network CNBC, which fetishizes tax cuts and unfettered free markets, is now among their hated enemies may say more about where the Republican Party is today than anything those candidates said in the debate. They don't know who they are anymore.
October 28, 2015
Brace yourselves, climate change is coming: These 41 areas could be subject to untimely natural disasters
Rising surface temperatures due to climate change could have grave consequences for human life. An international group of scientists has pinpointed 41 specific places around the globe where abrupt temperature changes could trigger natural disasters affecting ocean currents, sea ice, snow cover, tundra permafrost and terrestrial biosphere. The scientists cite environmental neglect and over-exploitation of the Earth's resources as the main contributing factors. These "global warming tipping points" include regions that host critical elements of Earth's planetary system, such as the Amazon forest and the Tibetan plateau. While none of the areas implicated in the study are located near any major cities, the potential impact to the planet could still be grave, as they could cause a domino effect that would intensify the risk of climate change and have dramatic impacts on ecosystems and biodiversity, which in turn could affect human civilization. Published online earlier this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), the study is the "first systematic screening of the massive climate model ensemble" that was presented in reports for the 5thIntergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations body that supports the ongoing efforts to establish an international treaty on climate change. The research team included meteorologists, oceanographers, climatologists, ecologists, and environmental scientists from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany and France. The researchers report evidence of "forced regional abrupt changes in the ocean, sea ice, snow cover, permafrost and terrestrial biosphere that arise after a certain global temperature increase." Even more worrisome is the fact that their research casts some doubt on the generally accepted goal of keeping the increase of global surface temperature to a maximum of 2° Celsius, as they found that 18 of the potential disaster events occur at global warming levels below the 2° "safe limit" threshold. These abrupt ecosystemic shifts, which are caused by an increasing global mean temperature change, suggest the "potential for a gradual trend of destabilization of the climate." Study co-author Victor Brovkin noted that these abrupt climactic events might lead to natural disasters. “Interestingly, abrupt events could come out as a cascade of different phenomena,” added Brovkin, a meteorologist at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg, Germany. “For example, a collapse of permafrost in Arctic is followed by a rapid increase in forest area there. This kind of domino effect should have implications not only for natural systems, but also for society.” We are already witnessing such impacts in the form of droughts, wildfires,more frequent and intense storms and other forms of extreme weather. Specific examples of "climate tipping" include sudden movements of sea ice and changes in ocean circulation, which is Earth's "conveyor belt" that maintains a stable climate. In addition, the scientists detected evidence of sudden alterations in vegetation and marine productivity, which could impact regional and even global food security. With demand for food on target to increase 60 percent by 2050, when the human population is expected to reach 9.6 billion, it is critical to assess the impact of climate change on agricultural production. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has called for "climate-smart" agriculture to maintain global food security through a rapidly changing climate. Sybren Drijfhout, the study's lead author, said that the study "illustrates the high uncertainty in predicting tipping points." Drijfhout, a professor at the National Oceanography Center at the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom, added, "More precisely, our results show that the different state-of-the-art models agree that abrupt changes are likely, but that predicting when and where they will occur remains very difficult. Also, our results show that no safe limit exists and that many abrupt shifts already occur for global warming levels much lower than two degrees." “The majority of the detected abrupt shifts are distant from the major population centres of the planet, but their occurrence could have implications over large distances.” says Martin Claussen, director of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology and one of the co-authors. “Our work is only a starting point. Now we need to look deeper into mechanisms of tipping points and design an approach to diagnose them during the next round of climate model simulations for IPCC.” 
The Hillary and Katy power alliance: Their savvy blend of pop and politics could be a game-changer for both
On October 18, Katy Perry wrapped up her nearly 18-month Prismatic world tour with a show in Costa Rica. Less than a week later, she was spotted performing at a Hillary Clinton rally in Iowa, where she was introduced by Bill Clinton and made her presidential candidate preferences quite clear. "I stand and I march with Hillary,” Perry said. “I believe in her future, her vision. I believe in her policies. I believe in equal rights for men, women, pay...Thank you for having me, she's my firework." At the rally, Hillary Clinton, in turn, expressed her admiration for the singer: "I have to give a special shout-out to somebody really special, somebody whose birthday is tomorrow, someone who reminds us that sometimes you just have to let them hear you roar. Katy Perry, thank you for being here." The mutual affection didn’t end there, however. The day of the Iowa appearance, Perry took over Clinton’s Instagram, posting snaps of her Hillary-in-2016 decorated nails, her custom-made Hillary-themed dresses, her niece coloring a photo of Hillary and (naturally!) a selfie of them together. The pop star also gave the candidate (a “fellow Scorpio”) an Etsy-worthy gold necklace featuring the acronym POTUS. If that wasn’t enough, Perry celebrated her birthday with a lengthy, heartfelt Instagram note about meeting with Hillary and educating herself about for what she stands. The conversation was apparently convincing: “Next year's election is one of the most important ones in decades, and the choices we make will have a profound effect on women for years to come,” Perry wrote. “So, I stand with her for my daughters and their daughters, and beyond what time gives me. Get informed, get involved and become empowered!” That Perry is swinging Democratic is no surprise: She was a staunch Obama supporter, both vocally and sartorially. And she’s not the only prominent entertainer who’s come out in support of Hillary: So have Lena Dunham, Kate McKinnon, Jennifer Lopez, America Ferrera, Ariana Grande and Ellie Goulding, to name a few. However, the specificity and confidence of Perry’s political support—her Instagram note specifically mentioned issues such as gun control, birth control, health care and equal pay—is impressive. Fans aren’t always thrilled when musicians get political, even in the abstract. For Perry to drill down and take a stance on pivotal, crucial issues is even braver, because it puts her squarely on the hook for resistance and criticism. However, that she’s using her platform and vast social media reach to promote women’s rights, and highlight the areas where equality is lacking or threatened, is significant. For some of her fans, it might be their first exposure to things their friends, older siblings or parents deal with on a daily basis. For others, it might spark their interest in seeking out more information about Clinton, or even politics in general. Either way, Perry is telling her fans that knowledge is powerful and empowering. As Perry herself wrote on Instagram, “I never want to be a puppet, and always want to feel my own purpose and ownership in everything I do.” That’s a mighty message to convey, especially because her assertion that politics are accessible is backed up by high-profile action. In a sense, Perry’s activism is a throwback to the ’90s musical climate, when musicians leveraged their popularity to boost awareness of social issues or injustices, and were almost expected to have a cause to support. High-profile benefit compilations such as “Born To Choose”—which benefitted NARAL (the National Abortion Rights Action League) and WHAM! (Women's Health Action and Mobilization)—and the Red Hot-associated “No Alternative” raised money while educating music fans. Another double album, “Home Alive: Art of Self Defense,” was released to benefit the organization Home Alive. The Seattle-based collective formed after the murder of the Gits’ Mia Zapata, and provided self-defense classes while speaking out and condemning violence. Festivals such as Lollapalooza and Lilith Fair, meanwhile, both had social consciousness baked into their framework. But Perry’s social media-driven support is a very modern kind of political stumping and protest. She’s starting a dialogue in places where her fans congregate, utilizing the communication methods and platforms they use; she’s not doing a glossy television sit-down or a benefit concert to discuss her love for Hillary or her political convictions. Her method is more one-to-one and direct, which makes it feel more personal. The Clinton campaign has adopted a similarly open voice for Hillary’s social media accounts: Her Instagram account features everything from vintage photos to Halloween costume ideas, while her Twitter account is a seamless mix of casual slang and more pointed political notes. Of course, the Obama campaign used social media to great effect in both successful 2008 and 2012 elections, and so it’s logical that Clinton would adopt some of the same tactics. However, it’s a savvy, candid approach that makes the advocacy and campaigning feel more organic and sincere. Of course, there’s no doubt that the Perry-Clinton friendship is mutually beneficial. The Perry association helps Clinton appear more appealing to young female voters, which is an important and increasingly influential demographic: A 2014 U.S. Census analysis of young adult presidential election voting habits found that since 1996, women ages 18 to 29 have voted at higher rates than men. Plus, Perry posting support on her personal Twitter account (or playfully commandeering Clinton’s Instagram account) feels far more casual and genuine than if Hillary herself was trying to court the youth vote on her own. And for Perry, her Clinton friendship draws attention away from the ongoing (and increasingly contentious) fight over her buying a convent in Los Angeles, and keeps her positively in the public eye even though her touring cycle is over. (Which helps, especially because she has a new live DVD looming, not to mention an app on the way.) However, it’s terribly cynical to view Perry’s support as a mere PR move or some token endorsement. She’s become more and more comfortable in her skin as her career’s progressed, effortlessly combining varied (and diverse) facets of her personality in ways that are both playful and serious. Sure, Perry’s musical brand is predicated on bravery, self-empowerment and speaking up—loudly. However, it’s clear that these characteristics aren’t just a posture for the pop star realm, but a belief system by which she’s choosing to live.
George Pataki: “The problem with the GOP is we question science everyone accepts,” like vaccines and climate change
In the GOP undercard debate, former New York Governor George Pataki attacked his own party for "questioning positions everyone accepts." He complained that Republicans publicly doubt whether "putting CO2 into the atmosphere makes the Earth warmer. Does it? It's uncontroverted." "Part of the problem," he added, "is that Republicans think of climate change and think, 'Oh my god, we're going to have higher taxes, more Obama, more big government, the EPA shutting down factories!" "I want Republicans to embrace innovation and technology," Pataki explained. "There's one country in the world that has fewer greenhouse emissions than any other in the world, and you know who that is? The United States. They're lower than they were in 1995, not because of a government program, but because of fracking and coal plants." Whatever good will he had earned with environmentalists was likely lost by his last clause there, but unlike the men with whom he was sharing the state, he did at least try to pretend that he lives in the 21st Century. Watch the debate live via CNBC.In the GOP undercard debate, former New York Governor George Pataki attacked his own party for "questioning positions everyone accepts." He complained that Republicans publicly doubt whether "putting CO2 into the atmosphere makes the Earth warmer. Does it? It's uncontroverted." "Part of the problem," he added, "is that Republicans think of climate change and think, 'Oh my god, we're going to have higher taxes, more Obama, more big government, the EPA shutting down factories!" "I want Republicans to embrace innovation and technology," Pataki explained. "There's one country in the world that has fewer greenhouse emissions than any other in the world, and you know who that is? The United States. They're lower than they were in 1995, not because of a government program, but because of fracking and coal plants." Whatever good will he had earned with environmentalists was likely lost by his last clause there, but unlike the men with whom he was sharing the state, he did at least try to pretend that he lives in the 21st Century. Watch the debate live via CNBC.In the GOP undercard debate, former New York Governor George Pataki attacked his own party for "questioning positions everyone accepts." He complained that Republicans publicly doubt whether "putting CO2 into the atmosphere makes the Earth warmer. Does it? It's uncontroverted." "Part of the problem," he added, "is that Republicans think of climate change and think, 'Oh my god, we're going to have higher taxes, more Obama, more big government, the EPA shutting down factories!" "I want Republicans to embrace innovation and technology," Pataki explained. "There's one country in the world that has fewer greenhouse emissions than any other in the world, and you know who that is? The United States. They're lower than they were in 1995, not because of a government program, but because of fracking and coal plants." Whatever good will he had earned with environmentalists was likely lost by his last clause there, but unlike the men with whom he was sharing the state, he did at least try to pretend that he lives in the 21st Century. Watch the debate live via CNBC.In the GOP undercard debate, former New York Governor George Pataki attacked his own party for "questioning positions everyone accepts." He complained that Republicans publicly doubt whether "putting CO2 into the atmosphere makes the Earth warmer. Does it? It's uncontroverted." "Part of the problem," he added, "is that Republicans think of climate change and think, 'Oh my god, we're going to have higher taxes, more Obama, more big government, the EPA shutting down factories!" "I want Republicans to embrace innovation and technology," Pataki explained. "There's one country in the world that has fewer greenhouse emissions than any other in the world, and you know who that is? The United States. They're lower than they were in 1995, not because of a government program, but because of fracking and coal plants." Whatever good will he had earned with environmentalists was likely lost by his last clause there, but unlike the men with whom he was sharing the state, he did at least try to pretend that he lives in the 21st Century. Watch the debate live via CNBC.In the GOP undercard debate, former New York Governor George Pataki attacked his own party for "questioning positions everyone accepts." He complained that Republicans publicly doubt whether "putting CO2 into the atmosphere makes the Earth warmer. Does it? It's uncontroverted." "Part of the problem," he added, "is that Republicans think of climate change and think, 'Oh my god, we're going to have higher taxes, more Obama, more big government, the EPA shutting down factories!" "I want Republicans to embrace innovation and technology," Pataki explained. "There's one country in the world that has fewer greenhouse emissions than any other in the world, and you know who that is? The United States. They're lower than they were in 1995, not because of a government program, but because of fracking and coal plants." Whatever good will he had earned with environmentalists was likely lost by his last clause there, but unlike the men with whom he was sharing the state, he did at least try to pretend that he lives in the 21st Century. Watch the debate live via CNBC.In the GOP undercard debate, former New York Governor George Pataki attacked his own party for "questioning positions everyone accepts." He complained that Republicans publicly doubt whether "putting CO2 into the atmosphere makes the Earth warmer. Does it? It's uncontroverted." "Part of the problem," he added, "is that Republicans think of climate change and think, 'Oh my god, we're going to have higher taxes, more Obama, more big government, the EPA shutting down factories!" "I want Republicans to embrace innovation and technology," Pataki explained. "There's one country in the world that has fewer greenhouse emissions than any other in the world, and you know who that is? The United States. They're lower than they were in 1995, not because of a government program, but because of fracking and coal plants." Whatever good will he had earned with environmentalists was likely lost by his last clause there, but unlike the men with whom he was sharing the state, he did at least try to pretend that he lives in the 21st Century. Watch the debate live via CNBC.
My trigger-warning disaster: “9 1/2 Weeks,” “The Wire” and how coddled young radicals got discomfort all wrong
About a year ago I was asked to teach a class about the evolution of the representation of sex throughout American Cinema. I started with the silent film (The Cheat) and ended with Spike Jonze's disembodied sex in Her. Along the way, I showed a number of sexually graphic films that caused a great deal of controversy.
At the time I was teaching the course, I was also figuring out a life outside of academia. I had been a wandering postdoc for a long time and was tired. A friend of mine had recently been violently sexually assaulted. I was a witness. The trauma she suffered, from the assault and the long, drawn-out trial of her assailants, led me to volunteer at my local rape crisis center. Working directly with folks who have experienced trauma, I entered the course believing in trigger warnings and gave them throughout the class, even though it seemed as though the title of the course was a trigger warning in and of itself. Regardless, I gave them for almost every film I showed. I even gave them for films that really shouldn't have needed them (i.e., Psycho).
Midway through the semester, because of my work in sexual assault prevention, I was asked to fill in for the Director of the Office of Sexual Assault Prevention Services at the university. The Director had to take a short leave so I was there to fill in temporarily. In accepting the position, I took on a dual role. First, I was an activist against sexual violence, supporting survivors on campus, but I was also an educator who believed that learning is about shaking up one’s world and worldview. I didn't realize that occupying both rolls at once would be impossible; failure was inevitable.
The first "uh-oh" moment came when was when I taught Pillow Talk with Rock Hudson and Doris Day. Rock Hudson plays the role of a womanizer (the irony of all this, of course, is that he was closeted). When he gets women into his home there are a series of "booby traps" meant for getting it on (who says that anymore? me). One seemed like a literal trap--the door locks itself shut. I suggested that this might be a predatory act. The class was suddenly divided--there were the ones who vehemently believed that Hudson's character was a rapist, and those who vehemently argued that he was not. This divide would get deeper and uglier throughout the semester, with me caught irrevocably in the middle.
Next, I assigned a reading by Linda Williams, a chapter from her book, Screening Sex. It looked in intimate detail at the first blaxploitation film ever made-- Melvin Van Peebles', Sweet Sweetback's Badasssss Song (SSBAS). The chapter outlined (with pictures), the plot of the movie and all the sexual acts that were in the film. Williams’ argument is that Blaxploitation and SSBAS arose from a reclamation of masculinity by black men who were historically emasculated and castrated (think of the killing of Emmett Till).
I assumed everyone had done the reading. I showed one of the scenes that Williams' writes about in detail. Before I screened it, I gave a warning, indicating that it was one of the disturbing scenes to which Williams refers. The scene shows a young Sweetback (played by the director’s son Melvin Van Peebles) having sex with a 30-year old woman. She finds him irresistible and thus starts the hyper-sexual evolution of Sweetback--every woman on earth wants to fuck him, including a whole bunch of white women. This, of course, is statutory rape. When the lights went on and the scene was over, two students left the room in tears. I was perplexed. I started to ask questions about Williams' reading, how it felt to read about and then watch the scene, what questions of race and masculinity it provoked. Crickets man, crickets. Clearly no one had done the reading.
Later that day, I had a white female student come to my office hours crying. Between picking up tissues and blowing her nose she said, "I'm doing a minor in African American Studies. How could your first images of black people be that horrible?" I told her that I understood her concerns. I went on to explain how the class was a historical look at sex on screen and as the reading for the class articulated, it was one of the first film's to show black people having sex and was important to film history. She still didn't get it. She said I had to show some positive images, otherwise it was unfair, that the other students weren't African American Studies minors so they didn't understand race politics as she did. I told her that I would bring a positive image to the next class to address her concerns. Finally, she smiled.
That night I went home and thought about it, hard. Isn't confronting difficult issues what learning is about? My classes were about race, gender, and sexuality. These are inherently uncomfortable topics that force students to think critically about their privilege and their place in the hierarchy of this world.
It's not fun to talk about inequality. It's not fun to talk about slavery. It's not fun to talk about the complexity of sexual desire. It's terribly, terribly, uncomfortable. But it was my job as their teacher to navigate through this discomfort. I felt like I handled the class poorly. I had cow-towed too much, so I went to class the next day prepared to break this shit down.
I also thought about a positive image of black sexuality and sex. I decided to show a clip from The Wire that shows Omar in bed with his boyfriend just after having sex, a tender moment where they kiss. Omar's character, a black, gay dude who steals from drug dealers, is a revolutionary representation of black masculinity that stands in stark contrast to SSBAS. I was excited to show it. I mean, it’s The Wire: who doesn't want to talk about The Wire?
I began class by talking briefly about learning through discomfort. The students were silent. I turned to them for questions about moments of feeling uncomfortable and how we could read these as productive. The student who came to my office raised her hand and asked, "Are we gonna talk about SSBAS."
“Yes,” I said, “but I want us to talk about any of the films that made people uncomfortable. Let’s discuss the discomfort." Her face fell. She started crying and ran out of the room. Her friend followed her. Right after she left I showed the scene with Omar. Later that day, she came to my office again, sobbing.
For the rest of the semester, I gave trigger warnings before every scene I screened. Every. Single. One. This wasn't enough. A student came to me and asked that I start sending emails before class outlining exactly which disturbing scenes I would be showing so that I wouldn't “out” survivors if they had to walk out of class when hearing what I was about to show. This took all the free form and off the cuff ability to teach. It stifled the teaching process. There would never be a moment for me to educate them by confronting them with the unknown, by helping them become aware of their own biases by making them feel uncomfortable.
Nevertheless, I did it. Each night I sent a meticulous email detailing which scene I was showing, where in the film the scene was, and what the content of the scene included. My role as a sexual assault prevention services specialist and survivor advocate eclipsed my role as a professor as I tried to accommodate students over and over again.
The next film to piss them all off was 9 1/2 Weeks. The film is about a S&M relationship between a character played by Micky Rourke and one played by Kim Basinger. At first Basinger's character is drawn to Rourke and they begin an S&M style consensual relationship. As the film goes on, Rourke becomes abusive and the sex becomes non-consensual, but the beauty of the film is that Basinger is eventually able to let go and take something from the relationship--a heightened sense of her sexuality and desires. There's an infamous scene with Rourke feeding Basinger a number of food items while she's blindfolded. It’s basically a series of soft core money shots. It is a consensual scene. When conversation began in class, a white male student started talking about the scene as one of consent. Four hands shot up. One said, “no—it is clearly not consensual.” Other students concurred. They argued that if someone is in an abusive relationship, they can never consent to sex because they are being manipulated.
This triggered me. I was furious.
Sexual assault survivor support is about empowerment. The model says, "hey! It’s not for you to tell the survivor what happened to them; that's their story, they know, don't fucking label it." What these students were essentially doing was stripping every person in an abusive relationship of all their agency. They were telling every survivor that they were raped, even when the survivor may have wanted to have sex with their abuser. They were claiming god like knowledge of every sexual encounter. And they were only 20. If that. Their frontal lobes haven't even fully developed.
I was done with it. I was drained. I was anxious. I was tired. I was fed up. But I didn't want to be. I had been teaching for ten years with passion.
I went to get advise from a colleague in the department. He listened and said that during that time of the semester, students tended to get testy. He thought it was seasonal. I asked him if he ever had such a hard time with his students and he said, "No, I am an old white dude, I really think that as a young woman of color they probably just aren't afraid of you, they see you as a peer." For the record, I'm not that young but he may have been right. And here's the irony, all of the students who were upset were the feminists, the activists, and there they were, treating a woman of color professor like she wasn't an authority while treating old white dudes like they are.
There has been a lot written about triggering and trigger warnings, discussions about how triggers are often not explicit references to one’s traumatic experiences. Smells, tastes, different objects, they can all be triggering. Think of Proust's madeleine and the surge of memories about his mother. Memory, emotional trauma, grief and healing are complicated and unique to an individual’s experience. Blanket trigger warnings treat them as impersonal predictable entities. The current movement of calling for trigger warnings prioritizes the shielding of students from the traumatic, whereas, ironically, so many other therapeutic models focus on talking through and confronting trauma as a mode of healing.
Recent work by Greg Lukainoff and Jonathan Haidt looks in depth at this phenomenon, the call for safe spaces and trigger warnings. Their tone could be read as condescending to people who are survivors of trauma, but I do think they raise a number of important points. Similarly, the work of Laura Kipnis on trigger warnings is crucial and illuminating, but in an unfortunate and sometimes typical academic fashion, it can be snobbish and dismissive (Jack Halberstam is also in this camp). Here lies the problem. Taking a tone like that just pisses students off even more. I'm not saying that if we said these things nicely, students would suddenly get it; they won't. I am living proof of that. I’m just pointing out the fact that putting on an academic face of elite speak isn't helping either. Maybe pointing out the horrifying political stance these students are making would be more effective.
When a Duke Student refuses to read a book because it has lesbian sex in it and students who are liberal, who are activists, also refuse to read and watch things because they see it as triggering, we see the collusion of the right and left wing. When I get an evaluation from this course that says, "as a white male heterosexual I felt unsafe in this course," and another that reads, "as a survivor this course was traumatizing," we are at a moment that needs some radical re-thinking. Do students of a radical nature think that if they are seeing eye to eye with the most extreme conservative element of the population that they are doing something right? Fighting for something positive? Participating in something different?
I don't have the answers. Hell, I gave up on the whole thing. This was the last straw for me. I didn’t know the answers but I knew this was a crisis. Colleges are the new helicopter parents, places where the quest for emotional safety and psychic healing leads not to learning, but regression.
I don't know about trigger warnings outside classes that deal with race, gender and sexuality, but I do know that if you promote trigger warnings in subjects that are supposed to make people feel uncomfortable, you're basically promoting a culture of extreme privilege, cause I'm pretty sure that the trans women who are being murdered weekly, the black men who are victims of police brutality daily, and the neighborhoods in America that are plagued by everyday violence, aren’t given any trigger warnings. Let’s be honest: life is a trigger.
The real story of “Our Brand Is Crisis” is how we screwed up Bolivia: Behind the bland Sandra Bullock movie lies another strange-but-true tale of botched American meddling
In case the true story behind the baffling and approximately well-intentioned Sandra Bullock star vehicle “Our Brand Is Crisis” makes any difference, here it is: Way back in the innocent days of 2002 (I’m kidding about “innocent”), the high-powered political consulting firm Greenberg Carville Shrum parachuted into Bolivia to take up the cause of a struggling presidential candidate named Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, universally known as “Goni.” Rachel Boynton, a documentary director whose work focuses on ideology, politics and power (her most recent movie, “Big Men,” is about the global workings of the oil industry), came along and made an extraordinary film about that campaign, whose title was drawn from a telling phrase coined by one of the GCS consultants. That is now the title of the Bullock movie directed by indie-film veteran David Gordon Green and written by Peter Straughan (“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”), which is also set during a Bolivian presidential campaign and stars Billy Bob Thornton, Anthony Mackie, Scoot McNairy, Ann Dowd and Zoe Kazan as Bullock’s rivals or colleagues in the Machiavellian business of reinventing candidates and reshaping public opinion. What makes this fictionalized “Our Brand Is Crisis” worth noticing – to the extent it is, which isn’t much – is that the filmmakers probably believe they are delivering roughly the same message as Boynton’s documentary did, but in fact the most important aspects of this striking story has been scrubbed away or laundered into Hollywood-style pseudo-psychological neutrality. This movie offers us the tale of the fall and redemption of an unscrupulous white lady -- who we know cannot really be unscrupulous since she’s Sandra Bullock. Although I hasten to add that even by the standards of Bullock’s implacable, steel-jawed underacting this is a dull performance. Around the edges of this story about Bullock’s character, an especially ruthless consultant known as Calamity Jane, there are a few intriguing hints of other stories about the international financial system, the power of fear in politics and the American understanding of what democracy means when applied to other people in other countries. “Our Brand Is Crisis” is being released by Warner Bros., but was largely funded by Participant Media, which produces what it calls “socially relevant films and documentaries.” In other words, in this case the right-wingers are correct: “Liberal Hollywood” is in full effect. Yet you really have to read between the lines and dig into the subtext of Straughan’s screenplay to perceive the issues that drove Boynton’s film. What the hell was James Carville and Stan Greenberg’s consulting firm – with its close ties to Bill and Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party leadership class – doing in one of South America’s smallest and poorest nations? Who was really paying for their work with Goni, an unpopular former president who had spent much of his life in the United States and spoke Spanish so poorly that Bolivian opponents derided him as “El Gringo”? I get it -- Green and Straughan and Participant were trying to make a Sandra Bullock movie that Warner Bros. can put onto thousands of theater screens. So those questions remain in the dim and dusty background, behind the quasi-hilarious dirty tricks, the long nights of booze, the almost-condescending interactions with indigenous Bolivians and the rivalrous relationship – tinged with both tragedy and Eros – between Jane and Thornton’s Mephistophelean (and distinctly Carville-like) Pat Candy. Yes, this is a movie where a diabolical character is given the surname Candy, and what can you really say? All this makes for mid-grade entertainment value, at best. And in the real Bolivian election of ’02, there was no rivalry between warring American spin doctors working for different candidates, because Goni was the only candidate who got that kind of help, in clear preference to his populist opponents on both the right and left. For people who want the vastly more interesting real history of America’s misbegotten meddling in Bolivia – just one chapter, of course, in a much larger global story – Boynton’s film is out there, and so is what happened later. Goni was in effect the candidate of the “Washington consensus,” the guy who would bring a small, fractious and deeply divided country into the established international economic order. As president in the mid-‘90s, he had pursued a controversial two-level strategy, extending constitutional rights and policy reforms aimed at Bolivia’s large indigenous population while also embarking on a widespread campaign of privatization that sold off state-owned industries and natural resources to foreign capital. As it happens – and I’m sure all this is coincidental – Bolivia contains immense natural gas reserves, the second-largest in South America after Venezuela, whose national resources had been rendered largely off limits to outside investors by the rise of socialist president Hugo Chávez. Carville’s troops were dispatched to La Paz in ’02 to consolidate the great victory of “liberalism” and “democracy” – as they and their sponsors and benefactors understand those things – and to resist the rising tide of Latin American leftism represented in Bolivia by the indigenous political leader Evo Morales, Goni’s leading opponent. Exactly who decided that a widely disliked candidate in such a small country merited such attention, alongside such star GCS clients as Tony Blair, the Israeli Labor Party and the Canadian Liberal Party? That remains a question shrouded in mystery, but we could probably come up with some decent guesses. Who paid for it? Well, that would be you and me – both before and after. Carville and Greenberg won that election for Goni, after shifting the entire theme of his campaign to the “crisis” mantra, but maybe they should have vetted their candidate a little better. Goni’s second term as president barely lasted a year, after his plans to allow an international consortium to build a pipeline and ship Bolivian natural gas to North America at dirt-cheap prices sparked a massive popular uprising. Facing a general strike and a series of confrontations between soldiers and protesters that left at least 67 civilians dead, Goni imposed martial law in October 2003, and the U.S. State Department issued a statement offering its full support. Have they learned nothing? That was almost certainly the final straw. Goni fled the country five days later, and now lives in exile in the U.S., which has refused to extradite him to Bolivia to face trial for extrajudicial killings and other crimes against humanity. Since 2006, Bolivia has been governed by Evo Morales, the indigenous leader whose protest movement led to Goni’s downfall. As one of his first moves as president, Morales unilaterally reversed the terms of Bolivia’s natural gas contracts with foreign corporations: Instead of the investors getting 82 percent of the profits and the Bolivian state getting 18 percent, it was suddenly the other way around. The corporations whined and complained, but ultimately decided that 18 percent was a lot better than nothing. Morales’ government has dramatically reduced poverty and inequality, and presided over one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, right through the crash of 2008. Maybe Carville and the Clintonocracy were empowering democracy after all, even if it wasn’t quite the variety they intended.In case the true story behind the baffling and approximately well-intentioned Sandra Bullock star vehicle “Our Brand Is Crisis” makes any difference, here it is: Way back in the innocent days of 2002 (I’m kidding about “innocent”), the high-powered political consulting firm Greenberg Carville Shrum parachuted into Bolivia to take up the cause of a struggling presidential candidate named Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, universally known as “Goni.” Rachel Boynton, a documentary director whose work focuses on ideology, politics and power (her most recent movie, “Big Men,” is about the global workings of the oil industry), came along and made an extraordinary film about that campaign, whose title was drawn from a telling phrase coined by one of the GCS consultants. That is now the title of the Bullock movie directed by indie-film veteran David Gordon Green and written by Peter Straughan (“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”), which is also set during a Bolivian presidential campaign and stars Billy Bob Thornton, Anthony Mackie, Scoot McNairy, Ann Dowd and Zoe Kazan as Bullock’s rivals or colleagues in the Machiavellian business of reinventing candidates and reshaping public opinion. What makes this fictionalized “Our Brand Is Crisis” worth noticing – to the extent it is, which isn’t much – is that the filmmakers probably believe they are delivering roughly the same message as Boynton’s documentary did, but in fact the most important aspects of this striking story has been scrubbed away or laundered into Hollywood-style pseudo-psychological neutrality. This movie offers us the tale of the fall and redemption of an unscrupulous white lady -- who we know cannot really be unscrupulous since she’s Sandra Bullock. Although I hasten to add that even by the standards of Bullock’s implacable, steel-jawed underacting this is a dull performance. Around the edges of this story about Bullock’s character, an especially ruthless consultant known as Calamity Jane, there are a few intriguing hints of other stories about the international financial system, the power of fear in politics and the American understanding of what democracy means when applied to other people in other countries. “Our Brand Is Crisis” is being released by Warner Bros., but was largely funded by Participant Media, which produces what it calls “socially relevant films and documentaries.” In other words, in this case the right-wingers are correct: “Liberal Hollywood” is in full effect. Yet you really have to read between the lines and dig into the subtext of Straughan’s screenplay to perceive the issues that drove Boynton’s film. What the hell was James Carville and Stan Greenberg’s consulting firm – with its close ties to Bill and Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party leadership class – doing in one of South America’s smallest and poorest nations? Who was really paying for their work with Goni, an unpopular former president who had spent much of his life in the United States and spoke Spanish so poorly that Bolivian opponents derided him as “El Gringo”? I get it -- Green and Straughan and Participant were trying to make a Sandra Bullock movie that Warner Bros. can put onto thousands of theater screens. So those questions remain in the dim and dusty background, behind the quasi-hilarious dirty tricks, the long nights of booze, the almost-condescending interactions with indigenous Bolivians and the rivalrous relationship – tinged with both tragedy and Eros – between Jane and Thornton’s Mephistophelean (and distinctly Carville-like) Pat Candy. Yes, this is a movie where a diabolical character is given the surname Candy, and what can you really say? All this makes for mid-grade entertainment value, at best. And in the real Bolivian election of ’02, there was no rivalry between warring American spin doctors working for different candidates, because Goni was the only candidate who got that kind of help, in clear preference to his populist opponents on both the right and left. For people who want the vastly more interesting real history of America’s misbegotten meddling in Bolivia – just one chapter, of course, in a much larger global story – Boynton’s film is out there, and so is what happened later. Goni was in effect the candidate of the “Washington consensus,” the guy who would bring a small, fractious and deeply divided country into the established international economic order. As president in the mid-‘90s, he had pursued a controversial two-level strategy, extending constitutional rights and policy reforms aimed at Bolivia’s large indigenous population while also embarking on a widespread campaign of privatization that sold off state-owned industries and natural resources to foreign capital. As it happens – and I’m sure all this is coincidental – Bolivia contains immense natural gas reserves, the second-largest in South America after Venezuela, whose national resources had been rendered largely off limits to outside investors by the rise of socialist president Hugo Chávez. Carville’s troops were dispatched to La Paz in ’02 to consolidate the great victory of “liberalism” and “democracy” – as they and their sponsors and benefactors understand those things – and to resist the rising tide of Latin American leftism represented in Bolivia by the indigenous political leader Evo Morales, Goni’s leading opponent. Exactly who decided that a widely disliked candidate in such a small country merited such attention, alongside such star GCS clients as Tony Blair, the Israeli Labor Party and the Canadian Liberal Party? That remains a question shrouded in mystery, but we could probably come up with some decent guesses. Who paid for it? Well, that would be you and me – both before and after. Carville and Greenberg won that election for Goni, after shifting the entire theme of his campaign to the “crisis” mantra, but maybe they should have vetted their candidate a little better. Goni’s second term as president barely lasted a year, after his plans to allow an international consortium to build a pipeline and ship Bolivian natural gas to North America at dirt-cheap prices sparked a massive popular uprising. Facing a general strike and a series of confrontations between soldiers and protesters that left at least 67 civilians dead, Goni imposed martial law in October 2003, and the U.S. State Department issued a statement offering its full support. Have they learned nothing? That was almost certainly the final straw. Goni fled the country five days later, and now lives in exile in the U.S., which has refused to extradite him to Bolivia to face trial for extrajudicial killings and other crimes against humanity. Since 2006, Bolivia has been governed by Evo Morales, the indigenous leader whose protest movement led to Goni’s downfall. As one of his first moves as president, Morales unilaterally reversed the terms of Bolivia’s natural gas contracts with foreign corporations: Instead of the investors getting 82 percent of the profits and the Bolivian state getting 18 percent, it was suddenly the other way around. The corporations whined and complained, but ultimately decided that 18 percent was a lot better than nothing. Morales’ government has dramatically reduced poverty and inequality, and presided over one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, right through the crash of 2008. Maybe Carville and the Clintonocracy were empowering democracy after all, even if it wasn’t quite the variety they intended.
