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IVÁN GUERRERO VS SVEN LUND Finally these two massive hunks fight each other! Perhaps Ivan acted too cocky with Sven? Let's find out! #gaywrestling #bodyslam #gutpunch #speedo #hunks #worship #muscles #bodyscissors #bodybuiler #rearnakedchoke #rack

16,790 просмотров • 3 месяцев назад •via X (Twitter)

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Analyzing Episode 44. Season 2 aka Choice vs Force, and the Repeating Patterns of Oppression When it comes to injustice and oppression in human societies, I find there are three kinds of people. Some are silent watchers, others are enablers, and then there are those who resist. Resistance matters because silence makes room for oppression to grow, and enabling oppression feeds it, until it morphs into a tyrannical beast. But resistance? That's a disrupting force. It reminds systems built on cruelty that human power is never absolute and that fear is never forever. It reminds us that injustice can only survive as long as it goes unchallenged. Even where resistance doesn't bear immediate fruit, it redraws the moral line and allows the victims to be seen. It tells the oppressors their evil is being recorded. Societies don't change because everyone always agrees on something. They change because of a few who refuse to comply with the decrepit patterns of abuse. But what does any of this have to do with episode 44? Well, let's see. We have two stories running parallel in the episode - that of Alya and Cihan, and Kaya and Zerrin. What's common in both tales? Quite a few things, but most importantly, for me, it's how the male-dominated structure of Mardin wants to force two women to live their lives according to what the system dictates is right, rather than what they want themselves. Both Demir and Boran refuse to give up, despite knowing full well that Zerrin and Alya love someone else. And, I refuse to legitimize their behavior built on past traumas, because hey, life ain't easy for anyone. But that doesn't give us a pass to behave like monsters. This entire episode, to me, seems like a tussle between choice and force. The old guard of Mardin, used to issuing orders and having them followed in silence, coming face to face with resistance. With the will to live life on one's own terms. Almost like the writer is trying to say, 'see this shit will just keep going until someone screams enough and fights back.' Let's start with the beginning of the episode. Demir abducts Zerrin and lies about her baby dying so he can later use the same child to blackmail Zerrin into staying with him. Why? Because the psychopath can't see beyond his own wants. Zerrin's choices don't register because to him, she's not a person, just someone to be managed and controlled. So, force becomes his default setting; he lies, emotionally terrorizes, manipulates, does everything to get his own way. And, in this way, he embodies what the episode keeps repeating, that oppression doesn't always have to be violent. Sometimes, it's your refusal to acknowledge someone else's right to choose. There's another scene that stands out to me in this context, where Cihan and Alya are having a conversation, far from the cray cray crowd. In that scene, you get to see what life can be like when two people see each other as equals and choose to work together. When Alya tells Cihan of her fears about Deniz, he doesn't brush them off. He acknowledges them. But then, he also reminds her that she's always been able to get through to her son, and that there's no way Deniz will choose Boran after she informs him of the whole story. What makes CihAl so attractive as a couple is their ability to see each other and acknowledge their humanity and individuality. There's no force here. They stay together because they want to, they choose to. Many people choose to part despite the presence of love, so feelings here take a back seat. It's about free will. Agency. That's the most fundamental human instinct. When you take that away from someone, it's almost like taking away their humanity. Now, I know some of y'all saw the episode and thought Deniz is gonna fall prey to Boran's manipulation. But that's not what I see. When Boran is trying to rip apart CihAl's family portrait, Deniz becomes the reason he can't. And sure, Boran does manage to sway Deniz close to him a time or two, but there are scenes where you can see Deniz pulling back. Like when he realizes Boran really isn't paying any attention to him in the room. And Deniz is Alya's son, too. Which means if there's something he wants, he's going to go after it all out. You can see that in the way he refuses to stop calling Cihan 'Baba' even though Boran tries his level best. Now, let's turn back the dial a little and think about the other message Guilzar let slip in the episode. When Ummu and Ihityar are talking about how Alya is being manipulated by Boran using Deniz, and there's nothing to be done about it, Kadir speaks up. In that scene, to me, Kadir is the writer, telling the audience that the weaponization of a child against a parent isn't acceptable. That the parents, in this case, Alya and Cihan, have feelings too. They've been through hell and were rewarded with true love. And they deserve to live that love. When Kadir says love like that is worth dying for, it seemed to drive home the point that you don't give up when you love like Alya and Cihan love each other. You certainly don't allow yourself to be boxed in a corner because of the love of your child. Because that, too, is a form of coercion. I'm not going to talk a lot about Boran and his tantrums because to me, he and Demir were mirror images in this episode. The ugly face of abuse weaponized as 'love.' And Sadakat? She's the worst kind of enabler there is. She keeps going, Alya, singling her out, simply because she thinks Alya is the weakest link. Since Sadakat can't stand to see her family break apart, she's only too willing to homage to the age-old custom of male compulsion by helping her pislik of a first-born. Ugh. Anyway, going back to the message of this episode - patterns of oppression on repeat? It kind of makes me glad that both Boran and Demir are going to step out of bounds to do something really fcuking stupid. Because their desperation will force a reckoning that's been a long time coming. Once these lines are crossed, one hopes what we see is change because Lord knows, it's time this damn pattern breaks, once and for all. #CihAl #UzakŞehir

CocoLoco

13,898 просмотров • 9 месяцев назад

👤: So, after finishing your music show promotions, how did it feel? 🦚: Oh, the generation gap is huge now. The age difference between us and the newer idols is basically like the gap between parents and their children, so it’s honestly very embarrassing. Even when they come over to greet us, we just awkwardly say, “Oh, hello! You’re the best, you’re the best!” and then run away. 👤: You’ve reached the age where you finally understand why your senior artists acted that way back then. 🦚: Exactly. There’s a girl group in our company called Hearts2Hearts, and one of the members, Ina, has a mother who’s the same age as us. 🐤: That’s right. Even if people called us fathers, it wouldn’t be strange anymore. 👤: There are a lot of moments like that these days, aren’t there? 🐤: Yeah, and the gap just keeps getting bigger. The parents of trainees nowadays were born in the ’90s. 👤: Oh my… that’s a big deal. 🐤: Coming here and talking about things like this… the aging of the entertainment industry really is a serious issue. 👤: And there’s no retirement or welfare system for it. 🐤: Exactly. I feel like Super Junior has raised the average age of idols quite a bit, so I’d like to sincerely apologize for that. 👤: It’s okay. You’re still doing great. 🦚: These days we get a lot of encouragement like, “Keep going! Stay strong!” 👤: It feels like everyone is cheering you on, saying, “Wow, they’re really working hard.” 🦚: Yeah, that’s exactly how they are. 👤: Do you still have fans who actively support you? 🐤: Oh, of course! 👤: Really? 🐤: They always say, “Don’t let our oppas get discouraged,” and they come to support us too. 👤: That’s truly precious. 🐤: It really is. Each one of those fans feels like a hundred people. We’re growing older together now. 🦚: Longtime fans are different. These days, fans use LED signs instead of handmade placards. So when we see people still holding handmade signs… 👤: They made them themselves! 🦚: That’s how you know they’re longtime fans, and they’re incredibly precious to Super Junior. 🐤: Actually, at our recent fansign, our fans are getting older too, so many of them aren’t familiar with buying tickets online. A lot of them told me, “Oppa, I couldn’t come because I didn’t know how to book the tickets.” 👤: So after being a veteran group for so long, you launched a brand new subunit and spent your first week promoting as rookies. How did that happen? 🐤: We had just finished our 20th anniversary concert tour, and for the encore concerts we wanted to do something different. We wanted to perform as subunits, but Heechul didn’t have one. He said, “Then I just won’t participate.” But I couldn’t let him sit out, so I told him, “Let’s do something together.” Then Shindong heard us and said, “Then you two should just form a unit together!” And that’s how our subunit was created. 👤: What was your relationship like? Were you always close? 🐤: No, we weren’t. 👤: Because you didn’t really understand each other back then? 🐤: As everyone knows from the “Great Incheon Incident” about ten years ago, we had a huge fight at Incheon Munhak Stadium. 👤: It was complete chaos! 🐤: It really was! But as we got older, we gradually started understanding each other better. 👤: Right, you probably don’t even have the energy to fight anymore. Did you enjoy working together as a duo? 🦚: I absolutely loved it! And Leeteuk gave me a lot of authority and freedom to lead. 👤: So who’s the leader of the unit? 🐤: Heechul. 🦒: Really?! 🦚: Yep, I’m the leader now. 🐤: Even for our appearance on The Seasons, Heechul personally arranged everything, contacted the program, and handled all the scheduling himself. 👤: Well, why wouldn’t he? He’s the best at those kinds of things. 🦚: That’s why I really wanted to appear on The Seasons. Since my older brother Si Kyung is the host here, I wanted to show him a brighter, more confident side of myself.

らがど||🐤

39,399 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад

One of the reasons I'm so reluctant to believe that any of the team (including the actors, directors, writers, camera crew, etc. (note, I left out production :D)) would ever harm this show (aka CihAl) is the absolute care taken in the tiniest details. I mean, take this THREE-minute sequence. Three minutes out of 2-plus hours is literally nothing. But the loving attention expended here on stitching the character's feelings, the backstory, the emotions they want to evoke in the viewers, and the song is incredible. Ahmet Kaya's 'yakarim geceleri' is perfect for the moment. A song that's about being unable to stop loving someone depite having lived through hell. About love being torment and comfort, pain and cure - it's absolutely beautiful. Here's the thing - I'm not a native Turkish speaker, but I understand the language much better than I can speak it, which is why, on rewatching the episode I was blown away how each lyric was devoted to Alya and Cihan specifically, to tell us, the audience, that these two are far from over. How? Let's start. The music kicks off the same time as Alya and Cihan's vows and Cihan telling Alya not to make him lose her. This is setting up the scene. Alya knows she messed up. She knows they promised to fight together and that she was the one to leave so the burden of guilt lies on her. And that's when the lyrics start. (Bu aşkın nüshası rüzgarlarda' - A copy of this love will remain in the winds.) This part shows Alya who carries her love, her wounds, and her guilt with her no matter where she is, a lot like the wind. It's wherever you go. ('Aslı bende kalacak' - But its original will remain with me). This part shows us Ciho. The one who claims to have locked up his heart, who has supposedly forgotten the past with Alya and whatever he felt with her. Clearly not. Because as the lyrics make clear, the love is still very much with him, in its original form, without any change. ('Bizi hasret saracak' - Longing will surround us. 'Bulutlar çıldıracak' - The clouds will go mad.) In other words, such a longing surrounds us that neither we nor the sky can bear its grief. And what do we see during these lyrics? Cihan remembers how happy they were just days before the wedding, how close they were. The next flashback is Alya telling him 'You overlooked my fear, you overlooked my frailty, I asked you for help, I wanted to take refuge in you...Cihan go!' So, unlike the man of ice facade Ciho presents to the world, he too bears the guilt of his actions. He sends Alya away when she returns contrite. ('Ayrılık başımı döndürüyor' - Separation makes my head spin. 'Kavuşmayı özlettin' - You made me yearn for reunion.) We're still focused on Cihan during these lyrics, who's sighing literally, like he's unable to breathe. So, even though he's angry and resentful, his heart keeps longing for Alya. He blames her for the separation, but wants to be reunited at the same time. ('İntiharlar kuşandım' I armed myself with suicides. 'Bu aşkı sen kirlettin' - You stained this love.) Now, this is interesting becuase what does I armed myself with suicides mean anyway? It's a poetic way of saying I set up my own destruction. And the visual matches too because Alya remembers the phone call where Cihan tells her 'Alya, I won't forgive you this time.' So, she's aware of the cost of her mistake. She's aware that her sacrificial nature set her up to lose home, and that if their love is broken and wounded today, she's played a big part in it. ('Geçtim borandan kardan' - I passed through blizzards and snow. 'Yitirdim bahçeleri' - I lost the gardens.) We see Alya recall Cihan asking her to leave during these lyrics. Once again, there's that theme of trangression and paradise lost. So, you can't really say Alya isn't sorry or that she's not aware of her mistake because you can clearly see it here. She knows she's living the price of her mistake, but does that make the pain any less or the longing less keen? Of course not. That just makes everything much, much worse. ('Ellerimi tutmazsan gülüm' - If you don't hold my hands, my rose. 'Yakarım geceleri' - I'll set the nights on fire.) And these lyrics right here, this is the backbone of the song and this scene. Because it relates a longing to reach out. This song isn't just about love lost, it's about wanting that love back with an even greater intensity. Which is why when the verse repeats for the second time, we see Cihan remember when Alya returns and they see each other again for the first time on that heavy day. So, essentially, what the song, the picturization, the lyrics are trying to tell you is both Alya and Cihan want to 'hold on.' No matter how hurt, how livid, how guilty they both are, they want the other to reach out and hold their hand. And when you think about Cihan's 'If I ever fall, pick me up' line, it takes the whole thing to another dimension entirely. All this information was conveyed to us, in a matter of three minutes. With masterful storytelling and music. With the perfect flashback scenes and Ozi and Sinema killing the expressions required. And no one, absolutely no one, wrote about it. Or appreciated it even though I'm sure it must have taken a massive amount of effort and team work. So, to end this post, my humble entreaty is, step back from the madness of what ifs and start learning to appreciate what is. Thanks, for coming to my TEDtalk. Hopefully, we wisen up a little. #CihAl #UzakŞehir

CocoLoco

30,567 просмотров • 13 дней назад

The Idea of NHI on Earth. ⬇️⬇️⬇️ 🔥"The gravity of it goes up a whole lot if it goes from the theoretical to the verified." ~Dr. Phil 🔥 "There have been people that have reported being abducted over the years. What's the intent behind that? Is it medical? Is it more nefarious?" ~BZ to Dr. Phil (I'm so glad Bryce went there.) "There will be people...who likely are going to need some some assistance to help deal with this because it is so far-reaching and for some people, potentially, very frightening." ~Mellon ~ Dr. Phil: "We know in the last 80 years there have been no overt hostile acts that we know about. That doesn't mean there could be things happening that are attributable to these forces that we don't know about. But, we certainly don't have any attacks that we can attribute to these UAPs or whatever." (Well, there's Colares in 1977. If that was non-human in nature, I'd say that qualifies as overt. And the Thomas Mantell incident in 1948 where he crashed and died after pursuing a UFO. Was that overt? Unfortunately, we don't know what happened and probably never will.) Dr. Phil: "And if the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior, I think people can take some comfort in knowing that if they were gonna melt us with a ray gun or something of that nature, they've had ample opportunity to do that. "They may have been here 1000 years before we were here. Who knows what the situation is? But we do know that as long as we've been monitoring this and tracking it, there have been no overt hostile acts and I think people can take some comfort in that, and should." (See the work of Peter Levenda for a deeper look at that. "They might have been attacking us for centuries already, in ways that make sense to them... What if they are attacking us through the manipulation of consciousness? ~Peter Levenda More... ⬇️⬇️⬇️ ~ (I'm glad Bryce pushed back a bit.) Bryce Zabel: "They should. The only thing I would say is, if we're dealing with a non-human intelligence - or an NHI, as we like to say now - we'd have to assume that they think differently than us. So even in our own world, in the United States, we tend to think in four-year terms because of presidential terms, right? So you can't get something off the ground if it can't get done right away. The Chinese may think in 100-year terms when they think about Taiwan or whatever. "It's possible there are alien or non-human intelligences that think in a different time frame. If their time frame was 1000 years, then they could just be getting started. "And on the topic of the nuclear issue, which I share concern of. I mean, I think the nuclear issue means it is at least a national-security issue of some kind. Now, I've heard people talk about this, Dr. Phil, two different ways. Some people say, 'Well, you know, they're looking at our nuclear capabilities because they want to protect us from ourselves.' "Okay, that's great, I hope that's true. But the other would be: what do you do before you actually go to war with anybody, is you do reconnaissance. You try to find out what the other guy has. What are their assets? What are their capabilities?" (That may freak out some people but all angles should be considered.) Zabel: "So, I think the problem that we need to overcome in this country is getting to a place where we understand this phenomenon that we're encountering enough that we can at least start to figure out intent. What is the intent? "There have been people that have reported being abducted over the years. What's the intent behind that? Is it medical? Is it more nefarious? What is it? And so, we got a lot of work to do, and I think that's why I am so supportive of your current efforts because you're, basically, saying, 'Let's get started, people. Let's really take this seriously. Let's quit fooling around and stigmatizing people that want to take it seriously, and let's get to work.' But let's get to work as a human race. Let's start sharing what we know and let's make progress. That's where I'm coming from, too." (Bringing up abductions is important because it IS part of this discussion and it shouldn't be avoided. Kudos to Bryce!) Dr. Phil: "I saw a study that said 71% of Americans believe that there are aliens that have been or are in our earthly space. And it's interesting...I read that in one context, it said, 'Look, this is not going to be such a big deal if this gets verified.' "You know, there's one thing to say that in the abstract, like, 'Yeah, I think yeah probably there are.' It's a whole other different situation if you turn around and see somebody standing there. The gravity of it goes up a whole lot if it goes from the theoretical to the verified. (100%. That's my favorite part of the interview and it's so true.) Dr. Phil: "And I hope that we are going to put enough context around this, particularly knowing that there are segments of our population that are very vulnerable. There are some elderly folks that aren't up on technology and might be overwhelmed by the reality of this. "We have certain populations that might be easily disoriented or destabilized in the mental emotional fringes of the population. And I worry about those that are easily exploitable. You know, you need to get out of the urban areas, buy our buried school bus in the mountains, and you'll be safe forever. You know the con artists and the scammers are going to find every opportunity to prey upon those that are concerned and worried about this. "And I think we need to be prepared to take care of those that might be destabilized by this information that's coming out right now, we can't pretend they aren't there. We've made those mistakes in the past, like during COVID, for example. There are those that are more impacted than others, and we need to be prepared to handle that." Christopher K. Mellon: "We, recently, commissioned a study by a group of six psychologists, PhD psychologists, on this topic of how the public would receive this information. And it was generally very encouraging. And what they found was that the great bulk of the population, as they have in the past with other epical changes such as the Copernican principle, or evolution, or general relativity, it takes people a while to process this information. There's a period of resistance. But most people will get up, get out of bed, go to work the next day. They're not devastated, even though there's nothing quite comparable to this, perhaps." (There's no perhaps. A government or respected figure admitting that we're not alone on this planet would be unprecedented and there is NOTHING we can compare it to.) Mellon: "What the study did find is that there is likely, however, to be a subset of people, maybe 15% of the population, that are going to need some help. And that we are not necessarily prepared in our present state to provide that kind of assistance, and we need to be doing more to get ready for that." (If he's talking world population, that's about 1.2 BILLION people who are going to need some help dealing with this. Holy crap. 😬) Mellon: "And also, to work on the messaging. The messaging is so important, clear and consistent messaging from the government, trying to develop trust with the American people so that the information is is accepted and acted on." (For me, I want the whole truth more than the right "message.") Mellon: "A lot of the difference will be people who can't get their head around it, even though they really understand it. But because of their own belief structure, the architecture of their own belief structure, for some reason, in their particular individual case, it's particularly threatening or disruptive. "So there will be people who fall into that category, according to this study, who likely are going to need some some assistance to help deal with this because it is so far-reaching and for some people, potentially, very frightening."

Joe Murgia

31,404 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад

The way Cihan proposes speaks volumes. This is the extended, improved version of the 'I'm not promising you a rose garden, Alya' of ep 28/29. This is the proposal of a man humbled by destiny and life. Which is why it includes no boasts. Instead, Cihan states facts. Cold, hard facts about himself, his life, and the difficulties Alya will face if she chooses him again. Underneath all that honesty is a man desperate for Alya to agree, but this time, his anxieties take a backseat because this is too important a deal for Cihan to botch up. So, he tells Alya he can't promise her an easy life, but he can promise her all of himself, as long as she continues to grace his life with her presence. And, Alya replies 'evlinerim' and 'buna da varim' - in other words, she accepts him and all that comes with him. All the craziness, the hardships, and everything else are acceptable as long as she has Cihan with her. And, that's why I said this proposal and Alya accepting the proposal in the way she does is one of the strongest hints these two are definitely getting hitched. It's the crossing of another threshold in their lives and relationship (him calling the ring a 'key', carrying her across the doorway, and sealing the deal with their bodies). Kind of like 'don't regret it later' in ep42, and then Alya walking under the shower to rise to the occasion. Because while all hell does break loose after they're together, even then, they still don't give up. Think about it, what are the reasons that could push Alya into leaving? Even if someone lies to her about Serhat, we've seen her refusing to leave Cihan's side when the whole bocek drama. Could it be someone threatening Cihan? Nope. Alya isn't the kind to keep that under wraps either, as seen by how she tells Cihan Demir's offer and how she barges into the hotel, thinking the Bulgarians have him. I initially thought it might be because she wants to give Cihan the freedom to choose without any obligations, but after this proposal, that's out too. Because this proposal removes any ambiguity about where Cihan's heart truly belongs. Disregarding his feelings now would be equal to disregarding the choice he's already made. Remember how she asks Cihan why no one is asking her what she wants when they're on the Firat trip? She's not about to do the same to Cihan. Now, let's focus on why she'd stay. One, she has Deniz's custody, so there's nothing pulling her in two opposite directions now. Plus, she's certain now that Cihan will go to any lengths to keep her and Deniz safe. Two, Cihan's increasing emotional transparency. We've seen this before in ep26-27. The more Cihan opens up to Alya, the more comfortable she becomes in her own skin. And, this time, Cihan's being very open about what Alya means to him and how Meryem is a shadow of the past that no longer belongs anywhere in his life. Three, her own love for Cihan is a determining factor. Alya loves Cihan enough to stay with him despite Mine wielding Boran's parentage over their heads. She gives up Deniz's location to save Cihan. She donates her kidney to ensure nothing happens to him. She risks saving Cihan from a car that's about to explode - you get the picture. And four, Alya's growing ability to read Sadakat's moves. S1 Alya reacted to Sadakat. S2 Alya observes and picks her battles. She already suspects Sadakat is up to something that includes Meryem, so she's on her guard. Which means Alya refusing to leave this time will break the wheel. Cihan's last wedding witnessed a bride too weak to fight for her love (apparently) and thus lost the opportunity to be with him. Alya's done nothing but fight to be with Cihan. There's a reason why Cihan's proposal includes the words, "You had a hundred thousand reasons to leave me… but you stayed." That line isn’t there to foreshadow Alya finally walking away. It’s there to underline that Alya has already been tested over and over again - by Sadakat, by Mine, by Boran, by Meryem, by danger, by fear, by the chaos surrounding Cihan. Yet, every single time, she still gravitates back to him. That's the way I see it anyways. Guess we'll find out 😉 #CihAl #UzakŞehir

CocoLoco

17,017 просмотров • 4 месяцев назад

Make Art Not War: The Battle for Creativity It's Adobe's annual Max event in London today and scott belsky's spotlight on AI paints a clear picture: AI isn't just on Adobe's agenda, it is the agenda. Adobe has already scored a home run with generative fill in Photoshop, a feature now spawning entire categories of memes - including my own video, which surprisingly garnered a million views. However, Adobe's ambitions extend beyond still imagery. The Tanker Charges Towards Video At Max, Adobe's Chief Product Officer put an emphasis on AI video generation with Firefly Video. The tech tanker is charging full steam ahead to the next obvious modality for creation, leaving a wake of disruption for any upstarts bold enough to challenge it. The announcement isn't new, but it showcases the emphasis on new product development with a marked increase in the velocity we can expect from the creative tech behemoth. The company that defined the norms of video editing with Premiere, and motion graphics with After Effects, has now entered the realm of AI-powered creation. The wake-up call is clear - the tankers are moving fast. Goliath vs. The Upstarts This development spells a daunting challenge for the numerous start-ups that dared to dethrone Adobe in recent years. For plenty of use cases people have been asking: Why use Photoshop when you have MidJourney? Why use Premiere when you have Descript? Why use After Effects when you have Runway? These aspiring disruptors sought to chip away at Adobe's dominance by offering more specialized, user-friendly solutions - a process that can be characterized as the 'unbundling' of Adobe. Now, they face a head-to-head collision with the very Goliath they sought to topple. Creators' Toolkit: A New Addition But this imminent clash isn't just a tale of corporate competition. This is a story about the tools of creation and their impact on creators themselves and the very canvas of creation. The advent of Firefly, Adobe's AI-driven offering, reflects a broadening recognition of artificial intelligence as an integral part of the creator's toolkit. In other words, Adobe's massive ecosystem of creators needn't wade out into new waters to acquire AI capabilities -- they will simply be infused into the products they already know and (mostly) love, but more critically -- need to use every day to get creative stuff done. The Increasing Stickiness of Adobe's Tools The intersection of AI and creative tools like Photoshop's generative fill is transforming how creators perceive and interact with AI. When they encounter the innovative features of generative fill, they're not primarily thinking about the AI technology that powers it. Instead, they're marveling at the cool new tool that's now part of their beloved Photoshop. This immediate affinity for "Photoshop" masks the sophisticated technology behind it, essentially furthering Adobe's stronghold on the creative industry. Layer in Adobe's stance to training their AI models with sources like Adobe Stock that promise rock-solid data provenance, and you can see Adobe clearly wants to seem like the responsible adults in the room. After all Adobe elected not to put the Behance catalog to work, perhaps rightly so given the ethical backlash to the scraping Artstation imagery. Adobe's Thirty Something Conundrum But it's not all rainbows and sunshine. While Adobe sails ahead full steam, there's an intriguing conundrum waiting in the wings. With 30-year-old codebases forming the foundation of its most popular tools, Adobe faces a significant challenge: its software has back pain. But it's not just a technical problem -- it's also a philosophical one, akin to the ship of Theseus. Can Adobe modernize and refactor its code bases without sacrificing the essence that made these tools indispensable to creators? Can they innovate without alienating their long-time users who've grown accustomed to the 'Adobe way' of doing things? An Unexpected Solution? Interestingly, solutions might emerge from unexpected quarters. Perhaps it'll take an army of developers armed with GitHub Co-Pilot to alleviate Adobe's refactoring nightmare. By automating parts of the refactoring process, it could accelerate the evolution of Adobe's legacy tools, making them more adaptable to the rapidly progressing tech landscape while preserving their core functionality. In a twist of irony, the AI that's reshaping Adobe's offerings might just come to the rescue of its own legacy. As Adobe navigates these murky waters, opportunities are emerging for new entrants in the field. Startups might also find their moment to shine in the midst of Adobe's strategic and technological shifts. With their innovative approaches and less-encumbered platforms, they have the chance to offer alternative solutions to creators seeking novel, efficient, and intuitive tools. The Battle for Creativity The tech giant's journey through a massive transformation at a previously unfathomable speed will set the course for the next era of creative technology. Given the sheer ubiquity of Adobe tools today, it's by far the most common way creators will experience AI. But let's be honest -- this transformation will not be easy. The future of creative tech isn't written yet and as a growing line up of new entrants vie for the prize, one thing's for sure: it's going to be a darn good fight. Make Art Not War In the end, it is the creators who stand to gain the most. As Adobe and its competitors lock horns, they'll strive to deliver increasingly powerful, intuitive, and efficient tools. But, it's up to the creators themselves to harness these innovations. Only by embracing and mastering these new tools can they unlock their full creative potential. So what are you waiting for? Wield these new tools at your disposal and turn your imagination into reality. We are the architects of a new era of creative self expression. If you enjoyed this, drop a like and retweet. Follow Bilawal Sidhu for more writing on creative tech and AI.

Bilawal Sidhu

72,192 просмотров • 3 лет назад

I find this explanation of the Chinese system by Prof Keyu Jin (in a recent lecture at Harvard’s Fairbank center) absolutely fascinating. Keyu Jin is a professor of economics at LSE (London School of Economics) and serves on the board of companies like Credit Suisse. She’s also the daughter of Jin Liqun, former Vice Minister of finance of China so she’s a rare West-based academic (maybe even the only one) who actually has insight into the Chinese system from the inside. Essentially what she’s explaining is that a key reason why China was so successful economically is because of its decentralized nature, which creates two mutually compounding loops of competition, as opposed to one loop in the West. What does that mean? Well, contrary to popular belief that imagines China as being this centrally planned economy where almost everything is decided in Beijing, the inverse is actually true: China is actually one of the most decentralized countries in the world. To illustrate this, a metric that’s always amazed me is the fact that in China local governments (provinces, cities, villages, etc.) control a crazy 85% of the country's expenditures. On average that same metric for OECD countries is 33% (as in 64% of the expenditures are controlled at the federal/national level to China’s 15%). In the US for instance, which is already more decentralized than most given it’s a federation with states, only 45% of the country’s expenditures happen at the state and local level: almost twice less than in China! The effect of this, as Keyu Jin explains, is that provinces and larger municipalities in China have an immense degree of autonomy over the way they run their respective economies and fiercely compete with each other. This is the first loop. And then of course the second loop is that you have companies competing with each other in the market. As a result what constantly evolves in China is not only companies themselves but the environment in which they evolve: you constantly have this or that province running a new policy that proves very effective, making them gain an advantage vs other localities, initiative which is then copied by other localities. This makes the economic environment incredibly dynamic as it allows the state to move in unison with the economy, as opposed to slowing it down as is often the case in other countries. So what’s the role of the central government in all this? The key role, Keyu Jin argues, is setting broad objectives as well as personal management and promotion. And this is what makes the whole system work as therein lies the incentive for localities to compete with each other: because local officials know that if they do a better job than their peers, they’re on track for promotion by the central government. In “China Inc”, the central government is the board of directors and HR, presiding over an army of local CEOs with immense degrees of autonomy over their own “companies”. Keyu Jin gives the example of the solar industry. There was at some point (around 2005) a directive by the central government to develop the solar industry. The graph she shares in her talk is incredible: within a few years you had solar companies as well as patents related to research on solar technology pop up literally everywhere in China. With the result we all know about today: China today completely dominates the solar industry and solar technology (according to the International Energy Agency China's share in all the manufacturing stages of solar panels exceeds 80%). As she explains, this makes the Chinese system somewhat paradoxical as it is at the same time incredibly decentralized but also incredibly effective at mobilizing the country for centrally-decided objectives, in fact she goes as far as comparing this effectiveness to the country being in a constant state of “wartime mobilization”. An interesting comparison would be if you had all the countries in North America, the EU and North Africa (altogether roughly the population of China) all united under a common leadership deciding on common objectives and on the career path of all these countries’ officials, based on how well they achieve these objectives in their respective countries. We’re seeing this system being mobilized in its full strength today on leading edge semiconductors after US sanctions, and this is why these sanctions will undoubtedly ultimately prove so self-defeating: once the Chinese “wartime mobilization” machine is given an objective - and you can be sure this objective is prioritized very highly - the fight is essentially over, you can consider it done. Once you have hundreds of thousands of PhDs, companies and officials all at the same time competing and working within the same broad “China Inc” roof to make something happen, it will ultimately get done. If you want China NOT to develop a technology, the very last thing you want is to make them mobilize the full strength of the machine on it. With the sanctions the U.S. effectively told China: “please we beg you, do dedicate your formidable economic mobilization power to becoming a semiconductors powerhouse as fast as possible” 🤦 Another particularity of the system that Keyu Jin highlights - and I’ll end on this - is that this system also allows China to “allocate losses to certain groups of people, interest groups and sectors” in order to “enact system-level changes'', something she says is “very difficult for other governments with more political constraints to do”. For instance we’re seeing this play out in real-time with the real-estate industry: China recognized there was a housing bubble and Xi issued its “houses are for living in, not for speculation” directive. We’re since witnessing an engineered deflating of the bubble, ensuring to the extent possible that the losses are borne out by real estate developers and speculators, and not too much by society as a whole. This is part of the reason why China has never suffered a recession in the modern era: it does controlled demolition when necessary but tries to ensure it doesn’t suffer massive crises like we’ve repeatedly witnessed in the U.S. for instance. Of course no system is perfect. Weaknesses of the Chinese system include for instance local protectionism: there’s a perverse incentive for local officials to protect their local companies in order to give them a leg up vs companies from other provinces, which ultimately comes at the detriment of everyone. Another weakness is corruption, a sempiternal problem in China, where local officials - who are extremely powerful due to the nature of the system - will decide that getting promoted isn’t incentive enough and will try to cash in on their position of power. Cracking down on this is also a key remit of the central government and of course one of the major initiatives of Xi since he came to power. Lastly, another clear weakness is obviously that everything ultimately relies on the wisdom of what the system gets mobilized for, on the wisdom of these broader objectives coming from the central government. If they’re ill-thought, you effectively have a whole country working towards the wrong objectives… On this we’re often told that this problem doesn’t happen in countries where what the economy works towards is set more organically by the “invisible hand of the market” but if you think about it, it actually happens just the same as the “invisible hand of the market” actually equates “what’s good for shareholders” and what’s good for shareholders isn’t exactly always a perfect proxy for what’s good for society, to say the least... For instance it’s absolutely insane that we’ve just had 2-3 generations in the West where the best and brightest went to work for the finance industry to engineer ever more convoluted schemes to make money out of nothing, simply because it’s insanely profitable to do so. Anyone looking at this rationally can see it’s not exactly the best use of our precious human resources as a society… So all things considered, if I had to choose I’d much rather have our broad societal objectives set by human beings rather than by the theoretical concept of “what makes the most money deserves the most focus”. And as it turns out the Chinese system actually fares decently well against capitalism: human beings aren’t evidently too bad at deciding what human beings should work on if they’re being thoughtful and strategic about it.

Arnaud Bertrand

193,688 просмотров • 2 лет назад

The Three Hidden Layers of Beauty in Swan Lake: When the Human Body Becomes Art The wonder of classical ballet does not lie in how difficult the movements are. Its wonder lies in a paradox: The techniques that demand the greatest discipline and control appear to the audience as the most natural movements imaginable. The audience does not see the tension in the muscles. They see only beauty. In Swan Lake, three essential techniques help create this unique artistic language. They are not merely dance movements, but three ways in which the human body transcends its own limitations and becomes something more graceful. 1. Port de Bras: When the Body Finds Its Inner Flow A master calligrapher does not create a beautiful stroke with the fingers alone. Each line emerges from the coordination of the entire body: posture, wrist, arm, and even breath. The arms in ballet operate according to a similar principle. When Odette extends her arms, the movement does not simply begin with the hands. It travels through the connection of the back, shoulders, and arms before flowing all the way to the fingertips. As a result, the audience does not feel as though they are watching an arm being raised. They experience a stream of movement unfolding before them. Just as a melody is not created by a single note but by the harmonious relationship among many notes, the ballet arm is no longer perceived as separate parts. It becomes a unified line. At that moment, human hands begin to take on the shape of a swan's wings. 2. Pas de Deux: When Two People Create a Single Movement Imagine two people supporting one another as they walk across a narrow path. What allows them to move together with ease is not who is stronger. It is understanding: When to step. When to pause. When to move forward. And when to offer the support the other person needs. A ballet pas de deux works in much the same way. Siegfried is not simply lifting Odette. Nor is Odette a passive body being carried through space. Both dancers participate in a continuous dialogue through movement. The man provides stability and support. The woman actively expands her body into the surrounding space. When their coordination reaches its highest level, the technique gradually disappears from the audience's awareness. It is no longer one person lifting another. It becomes an image of trust, harmony, and mutual support. In that moment, the audience no longer focuses on the physical effort involved. They experience only a sense of lightness, as though the body itself has transcended its own weight. 3. Cambré: When Softness Is Built Upon Strength Imagine a suspension bridge stretching across a vast gap. Its stability does not come from complete rigidity. On the contrary, its curve allows it to distribute force, absorb movement, and maintain balance. If it were too rigid, it would become vulnerable to external stress. If it were too flexible, it would lose its ability to support. Its strength lies in the balance between the two: Soft, yet stable. Flexible, yet structurally sound. The ballet body functions according to the same principle. When Odette performs a cambré, the audience sees a beautiful curve. Yet behind that curve lies a highly precise system of control. The spine opens with intention. The chest continues to lift upward. The neck lengthens. The entire body maintains balance. The curve is not a collapse. It is an expansion into space. Just as a suspension bridge does not fight against force but works in harmony with it, the dancer does not struggle against the body but learns to master it. This is perhaps ballet's most beautiful paradox: To create the appearance of effortless grace, the artist must possess an extraordinary degree of inner discipline. The Source of Swan Lake's Beauty These three techniques do not exist in isolation. They resemble three stages in the elevation of the human body. Port de Bras: The body learns to become a flow. The arms are no longer merely tools for creating shapes; they become a channel through which emotion is carried. Pas de Deux: Two bodies learn to become a harmony. Strength is no longer expressed through effort, but disappears into the subtle coordination between two people. Cambré: The human being learns to find balance between softness and strength. The curve is no longer simply an external shape, but a symbol of control, harmony, and grace. Together, these three layers of beauty form a journey: From the movement of the body. To the connection between people. To the balance within the human spirit. And that may be why Swan Lake is remembered as more than simply a beautiful ballet. Behind its flawless choreography, audiences do not merely see a well-trained body. They see something deeply human: The desire to transform heaviness into lightness. To transform limitation into beauty. To transform discipline into freedom. That is the enduring vitality of classical ballet — an art form in which the body does not merely move through space, but becomes a language through which humanity reaches toward a higher harmony.

🎼🌺Music Love♥️

13,833 просмотров • 2 месяцев назад

Elon Musk wants us building successful businesses here on 𝕏, NOT relying on X payouts. Elon is a trillionaire entrepreneur that got there by NETWORKING ideas and visions with others. He now owns a social media platform and wants us doing the exact same thing here. Elon wants you to build a following, find a business that offers a valuable service to the community and country, succeed beyond your WILDEST dreams with it and then NETWORK TO REPLICATE IT AND HELP OTHERS HERE DO THE SAME! That's the winning model that will not only benefit all of us, but be financially beneficial to Elon as well, and I'd like to explain why. Meta generates their primary ad revenue from big corporations owned by corrupt elites advertising their products to our asleep family members. Big Corporations HATE Elon so that is absolutely OUT of the question here on this platform, so they need an alternative model to pull in revenue to see an ROI ont he purchase of Twitter, and it's up to all of us to help generate that. Instagram is the complete OPPOSITE of Meta and Youtube. Instagram generates roughly 87 Billion dollars each year in ad revenue with a substantial amount of that coming from regular users of the platform who are also entrepreneurs working successful business between their niche content, and they are paying INTO ads to advertise that business between said niche content. There are 19 year olds on Instagram making 6 figures a MONTH drop shipping and they make courses teaching you step by step instructions how you can do it too. They pay anywhere between $15 - $20K a month INTO the ad program to advertise their businesses, between their regular content. There are MILLIONS of instances of this on Instagram and that is what's feeding a massive portion of the ad revenue program. The #1 reason people create an instagram account and actively try to grow it, is entrepreneurship. THAT'S what Elon wants us doing HERE! Now, the conservative space on Instagram is MASSIVE and 👉 LITERALLY 👈 all they do is lazily scroll 𝕏 all day to see the content YOU ALL are sending viral here, and they STEAL IT, easily moving it to their Instagram accounts to build their own following to then work a successful business. You need to understand that part very clearly. They're lazily stealing YOUR content from here, building successful businesses off it and posting videos of them traveling the world living lives of luxury. I've been tracking them doing this for SIX YEARS since 2020. If you can explain to me why they are more privileged and deserving than YOU to be living successfully off of YOUR work, I'd love to hear your reasoning on this. Now, i had a Zoom meeting with a conservative mom on Instagram that works the same business from home that I do, and she's helped over 60 people on Instagram grow their following from 0-200K to then work that business with her and she opened up her back office to me to show me everything and teach me how she does what she does and precisely how the Instagram algorithm works to grow. I'm not going into specifics, but it's absolutely clear based on my assessment that the development team behind Instagram makes it hard to grow there on purpose because they psychologically understands how to keep toxicity from taking over the platform by ensuring the extremely impatient "I want it NOW" people aren't able to grow large platforms to take over the entire platform. They understand these people are significantly more likely to spread toxicity across the platform, original content to drop, entrepreneurship to disappear and incoming ad revenue to dip much lower as a result. They understand those with military style determination and grit will stick it out to succeed, have much higher chance of being more intelligent to end up bringing original content to the platform, and have a much higher confidence rate in themselves to seek entrepreneurship, build community based income opportunities where anyone can come in and succeed to create very healthy communities, and then pay into the ad program to advertise it to succeed even more, turning the platform into a truly symbiotic relationship between the entrepreneurial users and the platform itself that allows them to grow and succeed in the first place. We're doing things all wrong here. 𝕏 isn't broken — our community is. These massive 1+ million follower accounts here that grew by putting MSM articles into Grok AI to have him rewrite them to avoid plagiarism charges and milk the 𝕏 revenue system and they will NEVER be able to figure this out because they're FAKING their intelligence by doing this and Elon does NOT want us idolizing accounts like that because they're giving us false illusions and impressions as to what success looks like. Elon wants us aiming much higher than 𝕏 revenue because 𝕏 revenue is NOT generational wealth to pass onto our children and we're supposed to be working together as a community to build things that are. Elon wants to be able to advertise this platform as having the MOST self-made millionaires than ANY other platform on the planet. As things currently sit, 𝕏 is single handedly leading any other platform for world news distribution, but we're trailing significantly in wealth generation. I believe the changes in monetization are to force people out of their comfort zones to seek alternative means of income generation to help correct that. We're not supposed to be competing with each other to gain 𝕏 revenue, we're supposed to be working together to build communities and revenue to compete with Instagram. The problem is, most of us came to this platform as slaves to a broken and corrupted system because we want change and have no language for these things. So, I'll be the first one to plant my flag. Do I know what I'm doing? Absolutely not. Do my children deserve having a mother that steps far outside her comfort zone to give it everything she's got to build something that gives them a better life? You bet your ass. Before my son was born with his tumor in his throat and the medical field bankrupted me for everything I was worth, I worked a VERY successful business from home that allowed me to homeschool my children. We've been pointing out all this corruption but what we now need are SOLUTIONS and community based systems to the corrupt system we're all stuck in, that anyone can implement and benefit from. I think it's time for us all to build that together and I'd like to start. We do have tools to fight back against the corrupt system but it's going to take all of us coming together to do it. The 2 BIGGEST ways we fund these corrupt elites every single month, is buying food and basic household goods from their corporations. All of our stores and corporations have become owned by a small group of Wall Street shareholder elites that lobby our politicians in Congress to look the other way while their corporations poison us and our children with their toxic products. We don't have to keep funding that system anymore as a parallel economy does in fact exist where profits are CUT OFF from reaching them and are instead redirected back to the American people. Wall Street elites like BlackRock-Vanguard and central bankers like JP Morgan & Chase does own 93% of the consumer goods sold in America. If the "conspiracies" are true, then BlackRock and Vanguard are owned by private Central Bankers that serve ENGLAND and they partnered with China to steal our manufacturing. Powerful banking elites purchase majority shares of the corporations for these Central Bankers, then moves the manufacturer to China. ALL of our consumer wealth is being siphoned out of America and going to England and China via this model and they lobbied BOTH parties in Congress through donations from their corporations to keep them silent about it. When we buy stuff in their stores, the profits are going to Wall Street and some of those profits go to product advertising on TV and that's what pays networks heads to pay the salaries of Fake News anchors millions of dollars a year to LIE to us. The video I provided in this post was Dylan Ratigan addressing the illusion of the left vs right paradigm IN 2011! He talks about all of our wealth being siphoned out of America. We were so close to figuring this out in 2011, then all of the DIVISIONS started to significantly ramp up against us to keep us fighting each other to keep this hidden so the theft of our consumer wealth out of the country could continue, to further hollow out America. Every time we buy Tide laundry detergent, we're funding the Military Industrial Complex and their forever wars because the same shareholders that owns tide — BlackRock-Vanguard — owns the weapons defense contracting companies that makes missiles and profits from death in forever wars. It's not just Tide, it's ALL basic household goods that we buy every single month as we send those profits through Wall Street when we support these corporations. Laundry detergent, dish soap, deodorant, shampoo conditioner, toothpaste, and EVERY other product that props up Johnson&Johnson and all these other cabal corporations. We can't fix America if we continue to support these cabal corporations that poison us for profit because they also own the pharmaceutical companies too and they've lobbied both sides of Congress to look the other eat while they do it. There's ONE family owned consumer goods manufacturer left here in America that can ship to MILLIONS of doorsteps and they make 470+ basic household goods that we still need for our families every single month from safe laundry detergent that won't give your children hives and rashes, to shampoo, deodorant, fluoride free toothpaste, dish soap, safe cleaning products that won't give you cancers or harm the lungs of your children and pets, to 470+ other basic needs as well as clean grass fed beef and steaks, and they've been right here in America for the last 41 years. They're a privately owned company and NOT publicly traded in Wall Street so profits are NOT going to Wall Street elites who then give them to Congress, the profits go back to us instead, which is the way things should be. Companies like this made no sense 20 years ago when we were all asleep and loved Walmart, but we're all waking up to what these corrupt elites have been doing and we need an alternative system that benefits families in America instead of powerful wall street pedophiles that own and control all aspects of our lives. It's not good enough to just shop American made anymore, we need to keep our consumer dollars OUT of the hands of Wall Street elites. They have NOT been responsible with our tax dollars, and they have NOT been responsible with the profits we send them by supporting their massive corporations, so it's time to cut them off and shift those profits back to the American people who need them instead. Walk around your home and look at all the household products you're buying every month that funds this corrupt system. We can squash their monopoly and reverse engineer ACTUAL capitalism and Robin Hood profits from the Wall Street elites by shifting MILLIONS of dollars away from them and back to people who need it, for everyday stuff we're already buying every single month from them for our families. Elon Musk wants us building community based wealth generating systems ON THIS PLATFORM to tear down the elites and rebuild the middle-class instead. We don't need more BREAKING posts. We don't need more corruption exposed, as we've seen enough to understand the entire system THAT WE FUND every month, is rotten from the top down. What we need is a community based system built for us that allows all of us to legally rob that corrupt system, and I think it's time we build it. Winter is coming. There's no better time to LEARN and build an online business and start building something that can be passed down to our children in the future, that's also beneficial to America, and I'd like to help build it. If you're interested in building it with me, you can message me here directly or you can email me! 🥰 [email protected]

Bridgett Fertig

51,521 просмотров • 1 месяц назад

"Expecting rebuttals to remain confined to journals, while misinformation spreads freely online, is neither realism nor appropriate. If something is promoted in public, it must be corrected in public." ~Proctor's Response to Coulthart (Why am I spending more time on this? American Alchemy's video on the mummies has 904,000 views. @incredhistory's video has 5,500 views. The original, sensationalistic claims always do MUCH better than any evidence that is presented later that throws cold water on said claims. That's always been an issue. That could change if Jesse makes a short video on his YT channel right now, linked to the @incredhistory video, and implores his viewers to watch it with an open mind. And/or if he pins a tweet linking his X followers to the "Incredible History" analysis.) "At one point in time, I was truly wondering if these [mummies] were a new species." ~Accused Debunker, Will Brown 🙂 "It's just too early, yet, for me to make any kind of definitive statement about what I think about these objects." ~Ross Coulthart (After watching the new video by "Incredible History" and the interview done on "Weaponized," it's not too early for me (and MANY other people) to say I believe they're fake. Others felt they were fake right from the start but I wanted to wait for more evidence. We have that now. From yesterday's "Reality Check" with Coulthart and Meagan Medick.) Coulthart: "I think (the new @incredhistory video) is important. It raises... I've actually been in touch with the gentleman who made it, Will (Brown), and I'm hoping to some stage, talk to him. And I'd like to include what he says in any analysis that we do on NewsNation about the tridactals." (Who are the experts featured in the new "Incredible History" video segments that I clipped below? Dr. Daniel Proctor (Galaxopithecus), "has a PhD in bio-anthropology. Specifically, his area of focus is the hands and the feet. He has published papers on the evolution of the hands and the feet, including focusing of the ability to grasp." Dr. Joseph A.P. Wilson (Joseph A P Wilson), "earned his doctorate in anthropology from the University of Florida. he's current lecturer in archeology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and part time lecturer in anthropology at Fairfield University. And more importantly., before academia, he worked as a molecular genetic technologist at Greenwood Genetic Center in South Carolina." Michele - Mrs Anthrope (Radiographer) - Mrs. Anthrope The descriptions of their credentials is from the "Incredible History" video which I clipped a few segments from and included below.) ~More from Reality Check~ Coulthart: "We've filmed in Peru, and we've spoken directly with the doctors there. As I said in social media commentary that was posted before I left Peru, it's just too early, yet, for me to make any kind of definitive statement about what I think about these objects. I'm very careful not to even say, beings." (Again, after the seeing the "Incredible History" video, it shouldn't be too early to offer up a new opinion.) Coulthart: "I certainly got the impression from the CT tomography scans that they seemed like intact beings of some kind. But frankly, I'm not an anatomist. I'm not an anthropologist or anyone with any kind of experience in a scientific analysis of these beings. And I think we'll have to go with what good science says. And all the way through in this, what the scientists in Peru have told me, and what the scientists in America and indeed in Mexico have told me, is they want independent review. They want independent assessment. "And I guess what I'm a little worried about is the partisan way, the way that on UFO, UAP, Twitter, social media, people take their positions and adopt in a definitive position once and for all. This is a hoax, or this is real. Frankly, I just don't think we know enough right now. I don't think you can base a final conclusion on an analysis of a couple of bones in one alleged being's scans. I've heard arguments two and for." (With the new information, it's NOT "partisan" and I am NOT saying "once and for all." But I think the arguments for fraud put forth by "Incredible History" are pretty damning and are enough to show anybody with an open mind that there are massive problems with the hypothesis that these are non-human beings or...hybrids of humans and non-humans. It appears to be a done deal: aka Fake.) Coulthart: "What I think will be definitive, and I'm aware that there is a DNA analysis underway at the moment. I don't know the name of the institution in the United States that's doing it, but there is some kind of DNA analysis underway, which will hopefully provide us with more answers as to the genetic origins of whatever these objects are. And that should be coming out sometime this year, hopefully fairly early up. "Until then, yes, I do think that we should acknowledge that there's been some great work done to raise, I think, serious questions about the legitimacy or the authenticity of the beings or the objects, but let's keep an open mind and let's reward and applaud good science where it's done. "This isn't like some kind of wrestling bout. You know, there's not a winner or a loser." (The credibility of the non-human subject is in danger of being set back because so many people in this community want to believe so hard and will ignore anything that goes against those beliefs. If these, apparent, hoaxes are not called out and done so, forcefully, we're all going to lose.) Coulthart: "Science is an iterative process where people basically do an analysis and make an assessment. Let's make those assessments, do the independent work, make sure that independent scientists with rigor get peer reviewed and checked and assessed, and then we can come up with a judgment. "I think the real tragedy would be if these are, potentially, if they are significantly important objects that have, basically, been procured as part of Peru's natural, cultural, significant history, it would be really tragic if, because of a sweeping assertion that these are a hoax, that the entire thing is not taken seriously. I'm not so sure I can dismiss it out of hand just because of this latest debunk, but I'm very, very happy to let independent, rigorous science do the do the guesswork and do the analysis." ~ (Will Brown (@incredhistory) responded to Coulthart's take via a reply to Meagan Medick's post.) Will Brown: "Curious why you all didn’t give the same reaction to Jesse Michel's (Jesse Michels) bold proclamations in a video that received 200x the views mine did on YouTube? "Similar question for Jay Anderson’s (Jay Anderson) 'scientific proof' video which has 10X the views? "Perhaps it’s because those videos don’t throw a wrench in whatever it is you are working on? "…any and all documentaries and books moving forward should include Steve Mera's testimony about what’s actually going on in Palpa." ~ Will Brown: "Hey Ross Coulthart, I’m hoping you’ll correct yourself here. In this video you stated we only looked at scans for one of the 'beings.' That is false. The video covers Maria and Monseratt. The Podcast with Jeremy Kenyon Lockyer Corbell and George Knapp adds Paloma in addition to Maria and Monseratt... All of which have multiple signs of manipulation on hands and feet. "You told me you watched my video…you even said you thought it was excellent and that it brought up legitimate concerns. "Did you actually watch the video? "Your statements today make me believe that you didn’t watch at all." ~ (And here's Dr. Daniel Proctor's (Galaxopithecus) response to Coulthart, and others, who are holding out hope for new DNA analysis.) Proctor: "I want to respond to Ross Coulthart’s recent caution that we should be careful calling the Nazca mummies a 'hoax' because they might represent cultural heritage, and to his claim that DNA should be more definitive than anatomy. "Respectfully, this framing gets the issue backwards. "First, there is nothing new here. 'Maria' was introduced nearly a decade ago. She did not appear last year, or this year, or as some sudden scientific revelation. She has been circulating since roughly 2015–2016, and in that entire span she has never been properly documented in reputable osteological, archaeological, or forensic journals. There is no provenience, as they allegedly come from a cave from an undisclosed location. No controlled excavation, no chain of custody, no standard reports of any nature, and anonymous discoverer. "What we are actually seeing is a slow drip of bodies, which are always sensational, always just beyond proper access, always promoted as revolutionary, and always somehow unable to withstand normal scientific scrutiny. That pattern is not accidental. "Second, anatomy is not secondary evidence. "The idea that DNA should be privileged over gross anatomy in evaluating human remains is baffling. Anatomy is primary data. Bones do not lie about how they articulate. Hand bones do not mysteriously relocate into feet. Developmental biology places hard constraints on what a viable organism can look like. "DNA can tell you what tissue something came from, within the strict parameters for which the tests have been designed. No mainstream lab has tests for some hypothetical 'alien' DNA. "Anatomy tells you whether the body ever existed as a coherent organism. In this case, the anatomy alone demonstrates fabrication. That is not speculative. It is observable. "Third, the cultural-heritage argument is deeply ironic. "The Nazca mummy trade, because that is what this is, destroys real cultural heritage. Looting graves, ghoulishly disarticulating bodies, recombining bones, and fabricating specimens for sale and spectacle is the opposite of preservation. Calling attention to that destruction is not disrespectful, on the contrary, it is necessary. "We have seen this playbook before. The commercialization of mummies, the alienization of cranial modification, and the recycling of colonial myths about 'non-human' ancient peoples. 'None of this is new. 'What is new is the social-media amplification. "Which brings me to Ross’s discomfort with debunking (or defending) these claims on social media rather than in scientific venues. "Here’s the problem: this hoax does not live in scientific venues. "It never has. "It lives on YouTube, on X, on press conferences, in podcasts, and in staged congressional spectacles. It is an argument of persuasion, not evidence. Expecting rebuttals to remain confined to journals, while misinformation spreads freely online, is neither realism nor appropriate. If something is promoted in public, it must be corrected in public. "Finally, caution cuts both ways. Being 'diplomatic' toward a hoax that incentivizes grave robbery, fuels pseudoscience, and misrepresents Indigenous pasts does not protect heritage. It only enables its continued destruction."

Joe Murgia

44,343 просмотров • 9 месяцев назад

Crazy week. Spent part of it in South Dakota, visiting trade schools and telling the incredible story of Build Dakota, a scholarship program similar to mikeroweWORKS that’s assisted nearly 3,500 kids with over $43 million dollars. I’ll tell you more about that later, and about how South Dakota is leading the country in the race to reinvigorate the skilled trades. For now, I just want to share some video from a ride-along I did on my way back to the airport. As it happens, the annual Buffalo Round-Up took place yesterday in Custer State Park - another one of things I’d always wanted to see. Well, I finally saw it, and all I can say is holy crap! Thirteen hundred buffalo who preferred not to be relocated, versus a couple dozen expert cowboys and cowgirls determined to get them out of the hills, into a valley, and through a narrow gate that led into a large corral. Assisting the riders were half-a-dozen F-150’s driven by park employees – one of which I was allowed to occupy. So much fun. Thousands of people showed up on a gorgeous morning to see what could possibly go wrong, and marvel at the sight of a buffalo herd on the move. The people lined the ridges above the valley, and watched for a few hours as the buffalo stampeded and the horses galloped and the riders cracked their whips and the trucks accelerated over the wild and rocky terrain, trying to keep the herd headed in the right direction. My driver, Cory, told me to buckle up and hang on. “You got one job, Mike. Keep an eye out for big rocks hidden in the grass. They’re all over the place. Last year, a driver hit one and snapped the chassis in two. Had a Senator on board. Not good.” Perhaps if I hadn’t been on the lookout for rocks, the attached video would look more professional, but it should give you an idea of what’s it looks like to chase a herd of buffalo in a pickup truck. In short, it’s a blast, but it’s also a bit unsettling. As we sped over the plains and over a massive prairie dog town, I couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if the buffalo suddenly all decided, together, to resist our best efforts to push them into a place they didn’t wish to enter. In other words, what would we do if the herd stopped acting like a herd, and realized that they were in fact, the superior force? Probably something similar to what happens when bipeds grow weary of being pushed in directions they don’t wish to go. I was about to share that philosophical observation with the other passengers in the pickup, when Cory ran over a large rock that I had neglected to spot. “Rock!” I yelled, a second too late. “Thanks,” said Cory, as his head bounced off the ceiling. Moments later, Cory’s walkie-talkie exploded with an urgent alert. “Rider down! Rider down.” Someone one the other side of the herd, hopefully not in the middle of the herd, was on the ground, and there was nothing we could do. A couple of EMT’s in a Razor were quickly dispatched to render assistance. I’m not sure what happened, but given the many thousands of prairie dog holes all over the sprawling landscape, I was worried for the horse as well as the rider. Herding buffalo on horseback is dangerous, and as I as tried to focus from keeping Cory from hitting anymore big rocks at high speeds, I couldn’t help but consider the business of hunting buffalo 200 years ago on this very land. Back then, at the beginning of the 19th century, there were something like 50 million buffalo in North America. They say the herds stretched for miles in every direction and moved like a massive wave over the prairie. To be a Dakota Sioux back then, riding a horse without a saddle into a vast herd of stampeding buffalo with nothing but a bow and arrow was amazing enough. To somehow bring one down and then live to tell the tale is mind-boggling. But maybe not as mind-boggling as what we did to the buffalo population in the decades that followed. That was nothing short of genocide, just as bringing them back from the brink of extinction was nothing short of a miracle. “Rock!” I yelled. Cory swerved to the left just in time, and then accelerated as a dozen animals broke away from the herd and tried to bolt back up the hill. I couldn’t help but notice they crapped as they ran - a lot. So much so, it made me wonder about the sheer volume of turds that 50 million buffalo would have produced two hundred years ago. (After 20 years of Dirty Jobs, my brain is still wired to ponder the impact of feces from every species.) Yesterday, the buffalo poop was literally everywhere. It was impossible not to walk in, ride over, or drive through. The tread on our tires was packed with scat, and that’s just from chasing down 1,300 of them. What would the poop from 50 million of these things look like? It must have been a foot deep for miles in every direction. And what would the impact of all that poop be on the early pioneers used to travel these same plains? How did their wagon wheels get any traction in all that dung? “Rock!” I yelled, again, just in the nick of time. The mind wanders when you’re riding shotgun in a buffalo chase vehicle, even when you only have one job to do. But if you ever have the chance to ride along on a round up like this one, do it. The sight will stick with you, even as you find yourself pondering the history of our great country, the impact of feces from every species, and the great good fortune of those lucky Dakotans who make their home here today. A home, where the buffalo roam.

The Real Mike Rowe

96,273 просмотров • 2 лет назад

Have you ever noticed that conversations between ChangYang and QingLang seem to happen on two different levels? ⠀ There’s the literal meaning—the words themselves, the information being exchanged, the obvious conversation taking place on the surface. ⠀ And then there’s the unspoken meaning underneath it all, where a simple exchange suddenly becomes something much richer, deeper, and far more intimate. ⠀ Let’s unpack some of those underlying layers. ⠀ “Aren’t you going to ask if I passed?” “Is it even possible for you to fail?” ⠀ That is quite the ego boost to receive from the person you love, isn’t it? ⠀ QingLang is essentially telling ChangYang that, in his eyes, there is simply no way ChangYang can fail when he sets his mind to something. Considering QingLang knows exactly how capable he is, this isn’t empty praise. It is an absolute vote of confidence from someone whose opinion matters deeply to him. ⠀ No wonder ChangYang can’t help but smile. ⠀ But there’s another layer to that exchange. ⠀ What QingLang is really expressing is his complete faith in ChangYang. He has seen how ChangYang consistently puts him first, how so many of ChangYang’s choices revolve around building a future where the two of them can be together. There is no doubt in QingLang’s mind that if ChangYang believes becoming a hunter is what will give them a better life, then ChangYang will find a way to make it happen—no matter how difficult or dangerous the road may be. ⠀ That kind of unwavering belief in another person cannot simply be demanded or given freely. ⠀ It has to be earned. ⠀ And ChangYang has certainly earned it. ___________________________________________ “Let’s figure out how to make these 21 days feel like 21 years.” “Why not 210 years?” “In the grand scheme of the universe, there’s no difference between 21 days and 210 years.” ⠀ At first glance, this sounds like ChangYang simply trying to make their impending separation feel less painful. ⠀ But I think he is saying something much more profound about time itself. ⠀ ChangYang is reminding QingLang that it isn’t necessarily the length of time spent together that matters. What matters is what you do with that time and how deeply you live it. ⠀ We tend to think of time as a quantity—as something we need to accumulate, preserve, and hoard. But time is really about quality. What matters is what you have experienced, what you have accomplished, what memories you have created, and how meaningfully you have lived those moments. ⠀ ChangYang and QingLang may not have had years together, but they have managed to make every second count. ⠀ Every conversation. Every touch. Every ordinary day. Every little moment of happiness. ⠀ They have filled those moments with enough meaning to sustain them through whatever comes next. ⠀ In that sense, separation becomes a little less frightening. When you have truly lived your time with someone, parting does not erase what you shared. ⠀ A short time lived deeply can become a lifetime of memories. ______________________________________________ “Let’s go back to Molie before you leave.” “It’s too far.” ⠀ Here, I don’t think they are talking only about physical distance. ⠀ Molie represents something much bigger for ChangYang and QingLang. ⠀ It is their haven. ⠀ It is where they met, where they got to know each other, where they played house, spent peaceful days together, and discovered what it felt like to simply be ChangYang and QingLang—two people in love—rather than the bastard son of a politician and a famous actor. ⠀ Molie is the place where they can put everything else aside and just exist as themselves. ⠀ So when ChangYang says it is too far, I think he is acknowledging another kind of distance—the emotional and circumstantial distance that still separates them from that life. ⠀ In a way, he is telling QingLang: ⠀ We’re not ready to go back yet. ⠀ There are still things they need to resolve. There are still responsibilities they cannot simply abandon. They need to settle their debts, make their sacrifices, and close the chapters that need to be closed before they can finally retreat to that sanctuary without looking back. ⠀ Because even if Molie is waiting for them, they cannot truly enjoy that peace if part of them is still wondering whether they should have stayed behind to deal with unfinished business. ⠀ Molie will always be there to welcome them home. ⠀ But before they can return, they need to make sure they are fully committed to the decision to leave everything else behind—without hesitation, guilt, or second thoughts. ⠀ They are almost there. ⠀ They can practically see it. ⠀ They just have one final stretch to survive. ____________________________________________ And perhaps the most beautiful thing hidden beneath all these conversations is something we’ve seen consistently from ChangYang: ⠀ He never makes promises lightly. ⠀ He doesn’t offer false reassurance simply because QingLang is anxious. He doesn’t say what QingLang wants to hear just to make the moment easier. Instead, he tells him the truth, even when the truth is difficult, and then trusts QingLang enough to decide for himself what he wants to do with it. ⠀ I love this aspect of their relationship because of everything QingLang went through with SYH. ⠀ After experiencing what false promises and misplaced trust can do to someone, QingLang needs a partner who will never manipulate his emotions with empty assurances. ⠀ And ChangYang understands that. ⠀ He would rather remain silent, say “I don’t know,” or admit that something is uncertain than make a promise he cannot guarantee. ⠀ That is why QingLang can trust him so completely. ⠀ Because with ChangYang, when he says something, he means it. ⠀ And when he makes a promise, you know he will move heaven and earth to keep it😭😭😭 #AWinterSunWakestheWindinSpringHillsDream #寒阳风起春山境 #FengQingLang #XuChangYang #XiongYiwen #LiuJingyu

Yaoi_Mazter

18,577 просмотров • 1 месяц назад

A teeny tiny notice before I proceed with my analysis. If you have a problem with either Cihan or Alya, don't bother reading. Because I don't take sides. I don't watch or think or write through the lens of Alya vs Cihan. Both characters are dear to me. And, if that's the way you roll, by all means, proceed. Analyzing Episode 36. Season 2 aka Of Strengths, Weaknesses, and The Last Nail in the Coffin Evvveeettt. Another episode, another meltdown. Just another day in the CihAl fandom. Ngl, it took me two days to even think about writing my regular analysis post, because the negativity was more potent than usual. Or maybe my resistance is waning, who knows? But that's not what we're gonna focus on today. This day, we analyze the words and actions of the heart and soul of Uzak Sehir, aka Alya and Cihan Albora. But we'll do so within the framework of strengths and weaknesses, because to me, that's what really comes to the fore in ep36. Alya Albora Alya Albora was especially heartbreaking this episode. And coming from someone who gets their heartbroken regularly because of Alya, that's saying something. The episode starts with the zombie-man opening his eyes (I think this PoS is just lying there pretending to be a vegetable, but that's for another time). And the look Alya has on her face when she looks at Cihan is indescribable. Almost as if everything inside her is pleading, 'Please don't regress back to where we just came from.' Because she fears, even as she tries to check on the zombie, that the closer Frankenboran gets to waking up, the further Cihan will drift from her. And, to an extent, her fears are proven right when Sadakat brings up divorce again. See, Alya doesn't come from strong family roots. She believes her biological mother abandoned her for most of her adult life. Then she has Caroline, who tries to fill all the empty spaces abandonment leaves in little Alya, but doesn't manage to succeed too much. As I've said before, Alya's primary fears stem from being abandoned and being a burden. That's what she tries to protect herself from. Those walls around her heart are in place to keep her from suffering that same pain again. That's both her strength and her weakness. While the fear pushes Alya to love harder, to push past difficulties, to rise from the ashes over and over, it also makes her more aloof. She doesn't find it as difficult as Cihan to leave behind 'family' ties because she's never experienced just how forceful those bonds can be. When it falls to her to choose between her love for Cihan and whatever she had with Boran, she picks the former without much guilt. But there's another factor that helps keep her from feeling much remorse for Boran, and that's the way her former husband treats her. Before Alya finds out about the will, her anger at Cihan is at an all-time high, and there's no question of any relationship developing between the two. After the will, however, that's a different story. So, when it falls to her to choose, she can do so easily, with her conscience at rest. And we see that so clearly in the way she announces she won't return to Boran even when he wakes up. Now, let's focus on the tricky bit. The weaknesses. Because Alya fears being a burden, being imposed on someone, adding to their strain, anything other than clarity can't help but raise doubts. When Cihan doesn't answer her question of 'Where will you stand?' with a clear with you or with you, distrust raises its ugly head. She starts asking herself if their relationship is what Cihan really wants now that Boran is back in the picture. She starts wondering whether Cihan will be able to shoulder the burden their relationship will add to his already weighed-down shoulders. It's harrowing to watch her be drawn to Cihan one instant, and pull back the next. Not because she doesn't love him, but because she can't bear to be another weight on Cihan's existence. That's what we see when she's shivering with fever. She wants him close, but she also doesn't want him to suffer. She keeps asking Cihan to leave, but he refuses to budge. And, that cures and hurts at the same time. For some reason, when she says, 'I'm also trying to find a way,' I couldn't help but feel that a part of her is already reverting back to the old Alya. The longer Cihan refrains from giving Alya a clear answer, the more her doubts grow. The more their 'impossibility' takes over her love. The closer she grows to wanting to leave. This time, if she attempts to leave, it won't be because her feelings overwhelm her. It'll be because she can't bear to see Cihan hurt anymore. Cihan Albora Oh boy. I can already hear the jeers of 'coward' and 'gavat' (which, by the way, I find to be a really ugly word) ringing in my ears. Well, fcuk that. Let's get back to our analysis. I talked about how Cihan seems to be stuck between suppression and surrender when it comes to his guilt. And, I did think that almost losing Alya would break that spell. But, clearly, that's not the road that Gulizar wants to take. Perhaps she does want it to come down to conflict. I'm not sure yet. What I am sure of is that Cihan is already aware of what he wants. And it's not wanting to be BFFs with Boran at the expense of Alya, guilt be damned. You can see it in the way his answers get bolder every time Sadakat asks him about a divorce. This episode is the first time Cihan states outright that the burden of 'conscience' isn't his to bear because he merely did what Boran asked of him. In other words, he didn't plan on falling in love with Alya, but it happened, and if there's any blame in that, it's not on him or Alya. Here's what irks most people. He doesn't ever talk about what he wants. It's always 'What if Boran wants this' or 'What if Boran wants that.' In other words, it's a form of misdirection on his part. He knows what's in his heart, but he doesn't want to say it out loud. Another scene where you can clearly see what his choice will be is when he's taking care of Alya during her fever. The more Alya insists that he leave, the more he digs in his heels. Until finally, he says, 'I won't allow anyone to hurt you, I won't allow anyone to harm you, and that's how it will be until I draw my last breath.' People don't say things like. 'That's how it'll be as long as I live,' if they're not sure about what they want. This is Cihan's strength. His love, protective instincts, and his code of sticking up for the people he loves. Unfortunately, like Alya, that's also his weakness. Cihan's been trained to fight for his family and his people to his very last. And, that's one HUGE reason why he can't verbalize what's already screaming inside his mind and his heart. We know he can't live without Alya, he says as much in the last episode. He keeps buying time because he knows once he states those words - there's no turning back. And he knows exactly how ugly things could go because dealing with ugly has been his entire existence. People won't be kind to him or Alya in the place where they live (think back to how Demir sends his goons to insult Alya's mom). And besides all that, what if Boran doesn't want to let go? That's when shit will truly hit the fan, because once Cihan says he's with Alya, he'll be fighting his brother, standing up to his mother, breaking his family apart, endangering Albora with internal strife, and worst of all, risking Alya and Deniz's safety. And remember, unlike Alya, who can control her conscience because of an extenuating factor, Cihan has no such relief. So, what you see is a man trying to survive an impending hurricane in a straw hut. He knows when that storm hits, and it will, things will go to hell. Besides all that, there is his stupid conscience that just won't shut the hell up because of that code of his. To me, that's not cowardice. That's a man standing at the edge of a life-changing truth, and being undone by the gravity of it. It's almost as if his soul is negotiating with reality, hoping to avoid collateral damage, while grieving for the version of himself he knows won't survive after he states his truth. As we can see in the scene where he and Alya are saying goodbye, they're already a family. His heart has already made the choice, so much so that in that scene, even Sadakat and Nare see the invisible bonds tying Cihan to Alya and vice versa. It's not a question of if, merely when. The Last Nail in the Coffin The question on everyone's mind is, what will it be? The last nail in the coffin of Cihan and Boran's brotherhood. The point of no return. To me, the way things are shaping up, there will be a clash. Will the showdown happen when Boran wakes up, or will Cihan learn the truth about his brother and finally be set free? I don't know. I've always had the inkling that Boran isn't what he claims to be. I guess we'll find out soon. But until then, I'll be watching. Gladly. For both my babies. Till next time, happy reading, y'all. #CihAl #UzakŞehir

CocoLoco

51,143 просмотров • 11 месяцев назад

Ch. 14 of NITRO: The Inside Story of Hulk Hogan's heel turn - #OTD 30 Years Ago (7/7/96)! AS DAY BECAME NIGHT at the Sullivan home, Bollea deliberated his participation in the pay-per-view. “Everybody was telling him that it was the wrong thing to do,” Kevin Sullivan says. “He was getting booed out of the arena, but they were all saying, ‘this is gonna kill him’.” With no end to the discussion in sight, the wily booker casually suggested that Bollea and Young make use of his two guest rooms until the morning. “I isolated [them],” Sullivan admits. “I was just afraid that at the last minute, he was going to use his creative control [clause] and pull out.” If Sullivan could deliver Bollea to the arena by showtime, the finish of the match called for Hogan to star in the most dramatic of surprise endings. In a sequence devised by Kevin Nash, an unannounced Hulkster would shockingly interfere in the match, but only after the heels gained an unfair advantage through cheating. It would be a brilliant misdirection, Nash thought, as fans would instinctively believe Hogan’s appearance to be in support of the babyface team. “I knew there were gonna be 55 different ideas,” Nash says, thinking back to the eve of the event, “[so] I actually put a lot of thought into it. I called Scott [Hall] two or three days before that, and said ‘what do you think about this?’ “We had to make it a 2-on-2 match with Lex Luger getting injured [during the match] and going out. We would cheat to get Macho [Man] in trouble and all of a sudden Hulk comes down, which of course would mean ‘ok, here comes Hulk to make the save’. [Hall] said, ‘I love it’.” There was, however, the looming possibility that Bollea could reject his turn at the eleventh hour. Thinking ahead, Eric Bischoff developed a contingency plan in which Sting would play the role, ultimately revealing himself - despite not having prior experience with the WWF - as the ‘third man’ instead. “I remember Eric came in to the locker room,” recalls Marcus 'Buff' Bagwell, “and said [to Sting], ‘I wanna talk to you about something’. I could hear them going over the idea, and then when they got done, Sting told me what they were talking about. He said that [Eric said], ‘there are only two guys that could turn heel where it would really matter’. That would be Hogan and Sting.” “He was offering Sting the job first, [as I recall], and Sting didn’t wanna do it. He didn’t really say it wouldn’t work, but he just said, ‘it doesn’t intrigue me. I don’t wanna do it’.” According to Andre Freitas, a special effects artist who worked in costume design and character development for WCW, the proposed Sting swerve was to involve the use of a doppelganger - or ‘phony’ Sting - presumably in an effort to fool fans that the real character had switched sides. “That was their original plan,” says Freitas. “Eric showed me a picture of Jeff Farmer (a lower-card wrestler) and said ‘can you make him Sting?’ I told him that they have similar bodies...then we looked at Sting’s hair and Jeff’s hair...and talked about all that stuff. I did a head cast for [Farmer] and some prosthetic and test make-ups. But when they secured Hogan, we didn’t do [the angle].” ----------- Amazingly, even as Bash at the Beach began, Bischoff continued to consider Plan B. “I remember walking by this perforated wall in the Ocean Center,” divulges Nash, “and Eric said to me, ‘Hulk is with Sullivan, and he’s not sure he’s gonna do it yet’. It was up in the air.” Meanwhile, viewers of the pay-per-view - and, for that matter, WCW’s own production staff - speculated as to the identity of the third man. “They were trying to ‘work’ everyone,” asserts Jason Douglas, a WCW producer backstage at his first pay-per-view event. “‘Rocket’ (staff member Rick Sancher) came up to me - they were kinda testing me because I was new on the road - and said ‘hey, I think it’s gonna be [WWF wrestler] Bret Hart’. I guess it was to see if I would leak something, and so I was just like ‘oh, cool, Bret Hart’.” In reality, aside from Bischoff, Bollea, Young, Hall, Nash and Sullivan, the turn would be concealed from everyone - even the announcers, according to orders from Bischoff - as to ensure their most realistic reactions. With less than an hour before the main event began, production staffer Woody Kearce discovered a revealing clue in the parking lot. A Hulk Hogan motorcycle had appeared mysteriously in one of the spaces, sparking another round of backstage conjecture. Finally, with what Sullivan recalls as “thirty minutes” and Bischoff remembers as “forty-five to sixty minutes” left on the air, Bollea belatedly arrived at the Ocean Center. The mood suddenly changed. Upon realizing that his star had been convinced, Bischoff began to relax. “Once he got to the building, I recall a sense of calm,” he reveals. “All of the anxiety, all of the tension, all of the worry, all of the effort to make sure things stayed quiet...all of that just kind of dissipated. It was like fog lifting when the sun comes out - it all just went away. I was thinking, ‘it is what it is, there’s nothing more I can do...so let’s just roll with it’.” To cement the turn, Bollea knew, he would have to deliver a monumental post-match promo to explain his actions. While typically, he enjoyed using Bischoff as a sounding board to rehearse interviews, the need for complete privacy - on this occasion - was unquestionably paramount. And so, away from prying eyes - and ears - the two met up in the most unglamorous of clandestine locations - a utility closet. In the midst of the run-through, Bischoff stopped to emphasize an important point: When you grab that microphone, I want you to say...‘this is the beginning of the new...world...order’. The phrase - ‘new world order’ - lingered auspiciously in the air. Bischoff surprised himself with the utterance, realizing slowly that the term encapsulated everything that the invasion storyline could represent. In 1990, then-president George H.W. Bush famously utilized the same expression in a speech to Congress, although its origin could actually be traced back to the 28th President, Woodrow Wilson. But if Bischoff was unsure as to the source of his spontaneous inspiration, perhaps the answer could be found closer to home - on the preceding Nitro, just six days earlier, announcer Larry Zybysko serendipitously made the following proclamation: “This Sunday, I promise you, there will be a new world order of wrestling…” Fans at the Ocean Center waited anxiously to see if Zybysko’s prophecy would materialize; for after all the hoopla, it was suddenly time for the main event. Before the opening bell, the audience was already on its feet for ring announcer@Michael_Buffer’s pre-match introductions. As Hall and Nash sauntered to the ring for The Hostile Takeover match, Buffer set the scene with theatrical aplomb: “Ladies and gentleman, at this time, let me introduce the men whose plan and goal is to takeover the WCW with force and hostility. We were told there would be three of these interlopers, and I must apologize as I have been informed - as you can see - there are only two. Ladies and gentleman, introducing...the Outsiiiiiders!” In a moment that played off perfectly on television, Sting’s entrance music began - and quickly ended - as ‘Mean Gene’ Okerlund traipsed cautiously into the ring. After exchanging quizzical looks with Buffer and referee Randy Anderson, Okerlund confronted the Outsiders to get some answers, an inspired plot device designed to build the tension even further. “Gentleman,” began Okerlund, “if I could have your attention...I don’t have police protection with me at this time, but I wanna confront you in front of this full house here at the Ocean Center, and millions of others watching across the country and around the world. I don’t see three men here tonight. Where is your partner?” Responding in a manner consistent with their WWF characters, Hall and Nash assured Okerlund that the third man was present - and ready. “Let me tell you something,” announced a confident Nash, “we got enough to handle it right now, right here.” Once more, Sting’s entrance music blared from the arena speakers, this time preceding the man himself, accompanied by Luger and Savage. “Here we go!” screamed color commentator Bobby Heenan as the wrestlers passed an unusually large contingent of security personnel on the entrance way. “The war is on!” Less than two minutes into the bout, Luger collapsed to the outside, a move in accordance with Nash’s plan to even the sides before the climactic reveal. “Now it’s two against two!” yelled Heenan. After a brief delay, the concerned crowd looked on as Luger left the arena on a stretcher, leaving Sting and Savage alone to fight valiantly for WCW. As the match progressed, the contemptible Outsiders used every trick to stall their opponent’s momentum, until a revitalized Savage began a furious rally at the fifteen-and-a-half minute mark. The invaders were suddenly down, but not out - as with the referee distracted, Nash landed a low-blow to bring the Macho Man to his knees. All four men lay on the canvas, exhausted, as referee Anderson started a ten count. As Anderson yelled ‘ONE’, several rows of spectators rose to their feet. Within seconds, the reaction diffused from section to section, the noise level increasing with each passing beat. On the live broadcast, viewers at home caught glimpse of a familiar figure making his way down the ramp. “Hulkamania!” screamed Dusty Rhodes on commentary while Hogan walked methodically towards the ring. Noticeably, the Hulkster seemed oddly disaffected - even out-of-character - but after exchanging the briefest of glances with the crowd, he continued stride with the din reaching fever pitch. “Whose side is he on?” bellowed Heenan, a question that seemed inexplicable given the history of Hogan’s on-screen persona. “Whose side is he on?” repeated Heenan, who as longtime fans could recall, had opposed Hogan for years as a manager in the WWF. For that reason, the comment flew over the heads of most (but not all) viewers; meanwhile, the live crowd was cheering as if their team had won the World Series. Nash and Hall retreated to the floor as Hogan tore off his shirt, an apparent signal that the archetypal good guy was here to save the day again. “Who’s bad now boys?” taunted play-by-play man Tony Schiavone on commentary, confident that WCW’s honor was no longer in jeopardy. Savage lay prone on the mat as Hogan surveyed the scene. Above the cheapest of cheap seats, peeking through a curtain with palpable anticipation, was Eric Bischoff. “I knew that something big was about to happen,” he recalls. “It was either gonna be a big failure, or a big success.” Seemingly out of nowhere, with his unsuspecting devotees enveloped in celebration, Hulk backed up to the corner. With the coldness of a serial killer, the once-honorable hero shockingly shoved referee Anderson, and executed his patented finishing move - the leg drop - to the helpless Macho Man below. The audience became completely, utterly unglued. “I was standing back with the announcers,” remembers Michelle Baines, newly hired as a production assistant. “One of the producers turned to me and said, ‘you need to go to the back’. “‘I said, ‘what do you mean?’ “She said, ‘it’s gonna get ugly real quick’.” “She was right - the crowd turned ugly quick.” In retrospect, it was clear that even as Hogan’s body approached the canvas - contact with Savage just milliseconds away - the gravity of the assault started to hit home. “What has he done?” questioned a crestfallen Rhodes, “is he the third man? What the hell is going on here?” Heenan was even more direct - “Hulk Hogan has betrayed WCW! He is the third man in this picture!” A breathless Schiavone could barely muster more than three words: Oh My God, he repeated. Oh My God, he continued, as Hogan high-fived a grinning Hall and Nash. The courageous Sting, stumbling to his feet to stop the injustice, was quickly dispatched, and in the coup de grace, Hogan tossed Anderson to the floor. Sardonically, he covered Savage for the pin, the contest now clearly a farce. “I hope you love it,” a disappointed Rhodes wailed on commentary. “You just sold your soul to the devil.” The third man was a mystery no more, and Hall, Nash, and Hogan raised their hands in victory to a genuinely astonished audience. The immediate outrage, which first gave way to shock, was now inspiring unmitigated rage. Simultaneously, the evil trio continued to taunt, pose, and antagonize while the announcers lamented WCW’s future. As Sting and Savage hobbled back to the locker room, a visibly distraught Okerlund returned to conduct an explanatory interview, based around the one Hogan and Bischoff had mapped out earlier. “Mean Gene,” commanded Hogan, “the first thing you need to do is to tell these people to shut up if you wanna hear what I gotta say.” For the next four minutes, Hogan rationalized his turn with remarkable clarity. “The first thing you gotta realize, brother, is this right here is the future of wrestling. You can call this the new...world...order of wrestling. These two men right here came from a great big organization up north, and everybody was wondering who the third man was. Well, who knows more about that organization than me, brother? I made that organization a monster. I made people rich up there. I made the people that ran that organization rich up there. And when it all came to pass, the name Hulk Hogan, the man Hulk Hogan, got bigger than the whole organization!” Bischoff watched from his secretive seat in amazement - he had not seen, nor had anyone, this intensity of emotion on display at a wrestling show before. It was almost as if the assembled masses had lost themselves in the performance, perhaps even forgetting, if only for a moment, that they were witnesses to a pre-determined event. Hogan’s actions had ostensibly interrupted their critical faculties; in other words, they had suspended their disbelief by reacting to the incident as if it were real. Moreover, the shock was manifesting in the most volatile ways imaginable, as in an incident edited out of future showings of the pay-per-view, a rather large man, likely intoxicated, ran into the ring before being knocked down by Hall and Nash. Concurrently, a stream of debris rained down from the stands, with one object hitting Okerlund, and the rest filling the ring in a stunningly unique visual. Hogan continued as the trash piled up around him, even referencing Ted Turner in his diatribe: “Billionaire Ted promised me movies brother. Billionaire Ted promised me millions of dollars. And Billionaire Ted promised me world caliber matches. And as far as Billionaire Ted, Eric Bischoff, and the entire WCW goes, I’m bored brother! That’s why I want these two guys here, these so-called Outsiders. These are the men I want as my friends. They are the new blood of professional wrestling, and not only are we going to take over the whole wrestling business...with Hulk Hogan, the new blood and the monsters with me, we will destroy everything in our path, Mean Gene.” “Look at all the crap in this ring,” responded Okerlund. “This is what’s in the future for you if you want to hang around the likes of this man Hall, and this man Nash.” Hogan raised his finger as if to stop the interviewer midstream, the perfect line instantly coming to mind. “As far as I’m concerned, all this crap in the ring represents these fans out here,” he boomed defiantly. “For two years, I held my head high,” ranted Hogan, alluding to his rather uninspired WCW tenure. “I did everything for the charities. I did everything for the kids. And the reception I got when I came out here, you fans can stick it brother! Because if it wasn’t for Hulk Hogan, you people wouldn’t be here. If it wasn’t for Hulk Hogan, Eric Bischoff would still be selling meat from a truck in Minneapolis. And if it wasn’t for Hulk Hogan, all of these ‘Johnny come latelys’ that you see out here wrestling wouldn’t be here. I was selling the world out, brother, while they were bumming gas to put in their car to get to high school!” In closing, Hogan foreshadowed the future state of affairs in WCW with a prophetic preview of coming storylines: “With Hulk Hogan and the new world organization of wrestling, brother...me and the new blood by my side...whatcha gonna do when the new world organization runs wild on you? Whatcha gonna do? What are you gonna do??” Despite mistakenly bungling the ‘new world order’ phrase at the conclusion of his speech, Hogan still provided the perfect punctuation to a sensational heel turn. His promo, inarguably the most dynamic of his career, came across as strikingly authentic (“it felt real, because it was real’,” offered a proud Eric Bischoff upon reflection years later). On commentary, Schiavone - who most inspiredly suggested that Hogan had planned to double-cross WCW all along, since his debut in 1994 no less - added to the realism with some mournful final comments: “We have seen the end of Hulkamania,” he grieved. “Hulk Hogan, you can go to hell! We’re outta here. Straight to hell.” ---- To the layman, there appeared an obvious explanation for the feverous crowd response that accompanied Hogan’s turn. Clearly, the element of surprise - one of the key elements of Nitro’s success - had been exploited to a masterful degree (“nobody on earth thought that the third man was going to be Hulk Hogan,” highlights Nash). To Kevin Sullivan, however, there were several layers of story at play. “People thought that it was an invasion from the WWF,” he begins, implying that the success of the angle could be correlated to its realism. “They really bought into it, and when Hogan turned heel...they were sure of it. “So while Hogan gets the credit for the reaction, it was [Nash and Hall] who set the whole thing up. Those guys built the foundation of heat, and when Hogan came down, it just blew up.” “We were red hot coming off WWF television,” agrees Nash, “and then you had the biggest turn in the world on top of that. The biggest babyface of all-time finally turned heel!” To the ever-meticulous Sullivan, always a keen observer of the nuances present in a wrestling angle, an often overlooked element was also noteworthy. “He did it to Randy [Savage],” the booker emphasizes, speaking of Hogan’s betrayal. “People knew there was real-life heat there. That helped out too, but everyone played an intricate part. “Lightning...you can’t catch it in a bottle but one time.” The above is an excerpt from the book, NITRO: The Incredible Rise and Inevitable Collapse of Ted Turner's WCW. Amazon USA: Amazon UK: Amazon Canada: Amazon Australia: 17+ Hour Audiobook Available at Audible and Apple Books Audible USA: Audible UK: Audible Canada: Audible Australia: Apple Books: Ultimate NITRO Bundle: Deep Cuts - Wrestling Stories in 60 Seconds! David Penzer AdFreeShows.com 83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff On This Day in WWE Allan Conrad the Mortgage Guy IandrewDiceClay WCW Archive Because WCW WCW4Life ᴀʀᴅᴀ Öᴄᴀʟ 90s WWE Secrets of WCW Nitro #WCW #nWo #HulkHogan #BashattheBeach #HeelTurn #Wrestling #WrestlingBooks #OTD #WWE #WorldChampionshipWrestling #Nitro

WCWNitroBook

53,506 просмотров • 3 месяцев назад

The Search For The Holy Grail of Rejuvenation Why Observing Nature's Chaos Makes Us Younger Modern life tends to zap us in a subtle process that takes four or five decades before it manifests as a host of prescriptions. Incremental decrepitude is commonly attributed to aging and considered entirely normal—although it isn't. Lately, the decline has been accelerating, with symptoms appearing in the early 20s or 30s, yet it is still considered normal—although it isn't. Both biochemistry and psychology feed each other in the abnormal loss of life juice. The ensuing rise of chronic issues provides a boon for the pharmaceutical industry and the anti-aging enterprises of "natural" creams, protocols, gadgets, supplements, high-tech chambers (with blinking lights), and even entheogens. The search for lost youth may trigger seekers to chase one pill and one gimmick after another, spending fortunes on looks and oomphs to hypochondriac proportions—leading to the opposite of anti-aging. We've all met the anxious type who comes across as a bit pale, eats and exercises in mathematically correct ways, yaps constantly about the latest "healing modalities," carries enough supplements to fill a Gucci bag, yet is continually battling some novel, increasingly disturbing hiccup in the body and mind. Other seekers on the same protocol may undergo a positive change, prompting the most fundamental question in the healing business. What Is The Holy Grail of Rejuvenation? After a significant health crash two decades ago, about a decade of experimentation with "natural" modalities, hundreds of sessions with "natural healers" from every corner of the world, and another decade of nutritional and lifestyle counseling with clients from every aspect of life, I was still seeking the Grail. The Grail is like that one thing you may get closer to, but you can never quite get your hands on. And as you get closer, you start getting weirder, at least to whoever's watching you. I've found myself staring at patterns in nature, convinced the answer is hidden somewhere in the bush of fractal forms, an algorithm that can change everything once we grasp it. For example, I used to study the flight paths and behavior of gnats without understanding why while my friends stared at me in bewilderment. I shot hundreds of hours of footage of the critters circling each other seemingly randomly. What were they doing? I became convinced that if you observe gnats long enough, you will discover a field principle that ties all of them together. Gnats are separate, yet also one. A hand clap would instantly synchronize the chaotic paths into one cohesive cloud, shifting a hair's breadth away from the source of the distraction in a perfectly synchronized fashion. "Uh-huh! Just like people!" I deduced, with the deeply furrowed eyebrows of Captain Haddock. This was during the height of the pandemic lockdowns in Vienna, Austria, when crowds of masked people seemed to move in perfect, equidistant unison and jump—at the exact same time—when someone appeared too close. Again, as if strung together with invisible cords. In addition to the behavioral insights, I gained an uncharacteristic sense of peace while observing gnats—a surprise that warranted further introspection. I have always had a subtle inability to settle and center—a trait that would have probably gotten me on amphetamine prescriptions had I ever visited a psychiatrist—craving constant novel distractions, whether it's work projects, drama, entertainment, or relationships—the four often melting into one. Suddenly, I was calm and present just by observing an insect species—an entirely abnormal sentiment. The excessive observation of gnats could have led to my institutionalization had it not evolved into the finer art of observing broader natural patterns—including clouds, trees, and mountains—and, thereby, a critical realization in the search for the Grail. Observing nature's chaos switched my autonomic nervous system, making me more centered and energized. I had found a way to exit a permanent fight-or-flight dominance, the underlying charge that contributes to most chronic issues. Long-term fight-or-flight moves the energy balance from the center to the exteriors, compromising the gut, which is responsible for our endocrine, immune, and neurotransmitter balance. Mess with your gut long enough, and you initiate a cascade of side effects, including oxidative stress, also known as accelerated aging. But there was also something deeper going on. Something inside the chaos was all but chaotic, an intuition that led me to study the electromagnetic nature of the universe, where everything was connected, shortcutting time and space, cause and effect. Legacy science ignores that 99 percent of the observable universe is plasma, often called the fourth state of matter—a hot, ionized gas with roughly equal numbers of positively and negatively charged electrons predominant in stars and the interstellar and intergalactic medium. Plasma exhibits intelligent, conscious behavior, connecting planets and galaxies by a unifying field principle unhinged from causal time and space—like gnats. A closer, deeper introspection of nature’s chaos reveals similar behavior. The patterns in nature and life are organized rather than disorganized, syntropic rather than entropic, instant rather than cause-and-effect. What's the significance of this? Since primary school, we learned that everything tends to fall apart eventually. The 2nd Law Of Thermodynamics states that in any natural thermodynamic process, the total entropy of a closed system and its surroundings will either increase or remain constant; it never decreases. Yet, the plasma-driven universe is open rather than closed, which made me wonder. Isn't it because of the misguided belief in entropy that we run after order, stability, safety, and security—to buy us a little more time from the inevitable Big Crunch, including our death? Isn't the fear of ultimate disintegration the reason we fence our property, accumulate things, buy insurance, pay for healthcare policies, and take medications and anti-aging balms? Isn't the chase for security a significant reason for our fight-or-flight dominance, as it prevents us from adequately centering and regenerating? Isaac Newton's Grand, Self-Destructing Realization Place yourself in the 17th century, when Isaac Newton was redefining the universe. It was a time when society was moving away from organized religion. The religious god of Western civilization was a vengeful male chauvinist who would fry you in hell unless you exhibited complete obedience. What kind of creator behaves like that? Yet people have waged wars and genocides over his name for millennia. No wonder folks gathered that it was time to get rational. The Renaissance had already nudged us towards humanism, and the Enlightenment was about to push us even further. People began to rely on predictability and logic to make sense of the world. Newton's laws of motion and gravity painted a picture of a clockwork universe where everything was orderly and predictable if you knew all the variables. The rise of scientific inquiry challenged religious dogma and the geocentric model of the universe. These shifts showed a growing preference for a universe that could be understood through observation and reason rather than one governed by mysterious divine will. We could finally engage our prefrontal cortex and expedite the Industrial Revolution with a sense of "rational hope." Nice, right? Not really. While Newton's deterministic universe made us feel in control, it also nudged us into seeing the world as a place where everything would eventually fall apart. The pendulum from theology to rationality swung too far. "Just be rational. It's a cold and dark universe out there. It will all come crashing down one day. Get insurance. Get a safe job. Buy a house, and settle down." And so forth. With Newton came the necessity of material security—an illusion. The newly discovered entropic world required predictability to find our footing. The suddenly overly rational world turned out to be just like the religious world, producing a sense of underlying fear and lack of meaning. Something was out there to get us unless we behaved in a particular way. Fear primes us to fight, flee, or freeze, even in its most subtle forms. It shifts our blood to our exteriors, away from the gut. It clouds our judgment and prevents us from living in the moment—wondering about tomorrow and yesterday rather than what's right in front of us. Fast-forward to the 20th century when another theory flips the script again. We discover the secret embedded in chaos theory, which breaks Newton apart. Deterministic unpredictability is a cornerstone of chaos theory, under which systems behave according to strict rules, yet their futures remain a mystery. It's like using the same ingredients but ending up with a wildly different cake each time. A prime example is the weather, which follows physical laws, but minor changes—like a butterfly's wings flapping—can lead to wildly different forecasts. Or the pendulum swing, one of the easiest trajectories to predict in Newton's world, is never the same since minor initial variations explode into vastly different outcomes. In mathematics, the Lorenz attractor shows how straightforward equations can spawn complex, seemingly random patterns—the mathematical version of the butterfly effect. Computer science jumps in with pseudo-random number generators (PRNGs), crafting sequences that seem random yet are rooted in determinism—perfect for cryptography. In biology, ecosystems evolve through a complex ballet of species interactions and environmental factors, making their future states as unpredictable as the weather. Deterministic unpredictability isn't just a concept; it's a universal truth that binds diverse fields in a chaotic yet intelligent embrace. Had Newton lived, he would have fallen into a deep depression. A doctor would have prescribed him SSRIs, which may have put him in a final tailspin. The bottom line is that the chaos we observe in nature isn't random; it's profoundly syntropic, leading to higher levels of order and complexity. Take a look at the clouds. Zoom in and forget everything else—especially time and place. Stay there and eliminate all rational thought as best you can. You may notice that the chaotic patterns reflect your thoughts and consciousness. There's a strange comfort in this realization. Our heart rate slows, and our autonomic nervous system chills out. Answers to life's big questions emerge in that silence. Nature's chaos, far from being a nuisance, can help us find our unique path and purpose. Contrast this with the modern obsession with career, appearances, and impressing others—a constant sympathetic dominance that ages us faster and leaves us unfulfilled—a meticulously planned future running on a hamster wheel, one dopamine hit after another. Modern life coaches tell us to visualize the future we want, break it down into small steps, and grind our teeth working through the predetermined ladder—which is repeatedly destroyed by predetermined unpredictability—increasing our likelihood of incremental decrepitude. Someone connected to nature's secret algorithm can let go of planning and follow a natural, magnetic path that calls their prime frequency. They would read the invisible messages in the clouds, the waves, and the trees, morning and evening, every day and find themselves by forgetting themselves. Jamming with the universe's natural order may be why some cells regenerate faster than others. Try it with a 7-minute collage of clouds shot in Costa Rica. First, kill distractions.

Jan Wellmann

120,306 просмотров • 2 лет назад