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<meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, user-scalable=yes" name="viewport"/>
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<title>14 December, 2021</title>
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<title>Daily-Dose</title><meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" name="viewport"/><link href="styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><link href="../styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><style>*{overflow-x:hidden;}</style><link href="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.css" rel="stylesheet"/><script src="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.js"></script></head>
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<body>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="daily-dose">Daily-Dose</h1>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-vox">From Vox</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</a></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>What Has Omicron Changed?</strong> - Although the initial findings on the new COVID variant are encouraging, it’s important not to place too much stock in them prematurely. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/12/20/what-has-omicron-changed">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How Former BuzzFeed Employees Missed Their Big Payday</strong> - When the company went public this past week, ex-staffers learned something alarming: they were unable to sell the stock that they had waited years to trade. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-communications/how-former-buzzfeed-employees-missed-their-big-payday">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>An Optimistic Scenario for Inflation</strong> - The key thing for the economy, and for Biden’s political prospects, is whether rising prices turn out to be temporary or permanent. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/an-optimistic-scenario-for-inflation">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How an Arizona School-Board Controversy Became the Perfect Political Issue</strong> - The discovery of a dossier on Scottsdale parents predictably turned into a national story. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-the-southwest/how-an-arizona-school-board-controversy-became-the-%20perfect-political-issue">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>What Angela Merkel Left Behind</strong> - She was the first woman to hold the office of Chancellor—and the first postwar Chancellor to leave the office on her own terms. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/angela-merkel-leaves-politics-on-her-own-terms">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-vox">From Vox</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><strong>Is a new kind of religion forming on the internet?</strong> -
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<figure>
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<img alt="A photograph of a sky and clouds at sunset, with a rectangle superimposed on part of the
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clouds." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/C6NGZycTwyC0_mxdUSizQnGD9t0=/374x0:6347x4480/1310x983/cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70268673/GettyImages_1147513273.0.jpg"/>
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<figcaption>
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Getty Images
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</figure>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Algorithms are surfacing content that combines Christian ideas like prosperity gospel with New Age and non-Western spirituality — along with some conspiracy theories.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="M8WRIr">
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“It just doesn’t sit right with me,” begins <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@evelynjuarezofficial/video/7028356231597329711?referer_url=https%3A%2F%2Fmelmagazine.com%2F&referer_video_id=7028356231597329711&refer=embed&is_copy_url=1&is_from_webapp=v1">a TikTok</a> by a user named Evelyn Juarez. It’s a breakdown of the <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/22772690/what-
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happened-astroworld-travis-scott-live-nation">tragedy at Astroworld</a>, the Travis Scott concert in early November where eight people died and more than 300 were injured. But the video isn’t about what actually happened there. It’s about the supposed satanic symbolism of the set: “They tryna tell us something, we just keep ignoring all the signs,” reads its caption, followed by the hashtags #wakeup, #witchcraft, and #illuminati.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="CXTYj4">
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Juarez, a 25-year-old in Dallas, is a typical TikToker, albeit a quite popular one, with 1.4 million followers. Many of her videos reveal an interest in true crime and conspiracy theories — the Gabby Petito case, for instance, or Lil Nas X’s <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@evelynjuarezofficial/video/6945555473907092742?referer_url=https%3A%2F%2Fmelmagazine.com%2F&referer_video_id=7028356231597329711&refer=embed&is_copy_url=1&is_from_webapp=v1">“devil shoes,”</a> or the theory that multiple world governments are <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@evelynjuarezofficial/video/6940452189831810310?referer_url=https%3A%2F%2Fmelmagazine.com%2F&referer_video_id=7028356231597329711&refer=embed&is_copy_url=1&is_from_webapp=v1">hiding information about Antarctica</a>. One of <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@evelynjuarezofficial/video/7026373497438063919?is_copy_url=1&is_from_webapp=v1">her videos</a> from November suggests that a survey sent to Texas residents about the use of electricity for critical health care could signify that “something is coming and [the state government] knows it.”
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</p>
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<div id="NdXAxo">
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<blockquote cite="https://www.tiktok.com/@evelynjuarezofficial/video/7028356231597329711" class="tiktok-embed">
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<section>
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<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@evelynjuarezofficial" target="_blank" title="@evelynjuarezofficial"><span class="citation" data-cites="evelynjuarezofficial">@evelynjuarezofficial</span></a>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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They tryna tell us something, we just keep ignoring all the signs… <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/fypage" target="_blank" title="fypage">#fypage</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/astroworld" target="_blank" title="astroworld">#astroworld</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/travisscott" target="_blank" title="travisscott">#travisscott</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/conspiracytiktok" target="_blank" title="conspiracytiktok">#conspiracytiktok</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/staywoke" target="_blank" title="staywoke">#staywoke</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/symbolism" target="_blank" title="symbolism">#symbolism</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/occult" target="_blank" title="occult">#occult</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/witchcraft" target="_blank" title="witchcraft">#witchcraft</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/illuminati" target="_blank" title="illuminati">#illuminati</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/satanic" target="_blank" title="satanic">#satanic</a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/wakeup" target="_blank" title="wakeup">#wakeup</a>
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</p>
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<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/Mysterious-6766699626247489537" target="_blank" title="♬ Mysterious - Andreas
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Scherren">♬ Mysterious - Andreas Scherren</a>
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</section>
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</blockquote>
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</div>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="8nNts3">
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Her beliefs are reminiscent of many others on the internet, people who speak of “bad vibes,” demonic spirits, or a cosmic calamity looming just over the horizon, one that the government may be trying to keep secret. Juarez tells me she was raised Christian, although at age 19 she began to have a more personal relationship with God outside of organized religion.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="A0VmuY">
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Today, she identifies more as spiritual, as <a href="https://news.gallup.com/opinion/polling-
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matters/267920/millennials-religiosity-amidst-rise-nones.aspx">an increasing number of young people do</a>, many of them working out their ideas in real time online. They may talk about <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-
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goods/21524975/manifesting-does-it-really-work-meme">manifesting their dreams</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/21436671/save-our-children-hashtag-qanon-pizzagate">faceless sex traffickers</a> waiting to install tracking devices on women’s parked cars. Some might act almost as prophets or shamans, spreading the good word and guiding prospective believers, while others might just lurk in the comments. They might believe all or only some of these ideas — part of the draw of internet spirituality is that it’s perfectly pick-and-choosable — but more than anything, they believe in the importance of keeping an open mind to whatever else might be out there.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tYQ0r6">
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I asked Joseph Russo, a professor of anthropology at Wesleyan University, if this loosely related web of beliefs could ever come together to form into its own kind of religion. “I think it already has,” he says.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="t0SCs3">
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Call it the religion of “just asking questions.” Or the religion of “doing your own research.” It’s still in its infancy, and has evolved in an attempt to correct a societal wrong: that the world is a pretty fucked up place and it doesn’t seem like the current system of dealing with it is really working, so maybe something else is going on, something just out of reason’s reach. The religion of the internet has also already culminated in real-world violence, the most obvious examples being the QAnon-related <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2021/1/6/22217657/us-
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capitol-breach-trump-rally-presidential-election">coup on January 6</a> and the conspiracy theories surrounding <a href="https://www.vox.com/coronavirus-covid19/22686147/covid-19-vaccine-betadine-hydroxychloroquine-ivermectin-trump-
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conspiracy">lifesaving vaccines</a>. Yet its more innocuous effects have been likewise transformative.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iv2N3L">
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Consider the widespread mainstreaming of astrology over the past decade, the renewed interest in holistic medicine, or the girlboss optimism of multilevel marketing companies. These are all frameworks of belief that question traditional logic and institutional thought — for instance, that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/11/upshot/labels-like-alternative-medicine-dont-matter-the-science-
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does.html">science-backed medicinal practices</a> work better to cure disease than essential oils, that 99 percent of people who sign up for an MLM <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2018/10/15/17971410/lularoe-lipsense-amway-itworks-
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mary-kay-mlm-multilevel-marketing">end up losing money</a>, or that the idea that your entire personality can be determined by the positioning of the stars at the time of your birth is <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/8/9/17661556/astrology-explained-netflix-horoscopes-sun-signs">fundamentally false</a>. These are beliefs that cast oneself as the exception to the normal rules of the universe, that perhaps even if the data says that rates of violent crime have dropped <a href="https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/many-americans-are-
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convinced-crime-is-rising-in-the-u-s-theyre-wrong/">considerably since the 1990s</a>, you, personally, are in far graver danger than you were the year before.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DsPqdT">
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2020 was the <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/341963/church-membership-falls-below-majority-first-time.aspx">first year on record</a> that the majority of Americans said they did not belong to a church, synagogue, or mosque; from the 1930s to the turn of the 21st century, around 70 percent of Americans did belong to one. Americans, particularly younger ones, increasingly report that they <a href="https://news.gallup.com/opinion/polling-matters/267920/millennials-religiosity-
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amidst-rise-nones.aspx">have no religious preference</a>, or as some have put it, it’s “the rise of the nones.” But perhaps “none” doesn’t quite tell the whole story.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="XjDpIX">
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The religion of the internet posits questions like, “what’s the harm in believing?” and “why shouldn’t I be prepared for the worst?” The deeper you go, the harder those questions are to answer.
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</p>
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<hr class="p-entry-hr" id="Q8ujOr"/>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gmj0kG">
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Perhaps it’s all because of the Puritans. They were the ones, after all, who consecrated the American legacy of individualism, piety, and hard work at the expense of all else. Or maybe it came out of the recurrent phenomena of Protestant-led Great Awakenings that have peppered US history since before it was a country, social movements that preached the importance of one’s personal relationship with God outside of organized rituals and ceremonies.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="45hFTv">
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“It was the idea that you could perfect yourself, your health, and your circumstances,” explains Mary Wrenn, an economics professor at the University of the West of England Bristol who studies neoliberalism and religion. This eventually culminated in the <a href="https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/9/1/15951874/prosperity-gospel-explained-why-joel-osteen-believes-prayer-can-
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make-you-rich-trump">prosperity gospel</a>, known best for its charismatic leaders preaching financial wealth and the widespread practice of manifesting, or the idea that in order to make positive things happen in your life, all you have to do is pretend as though they already are. “It’s during periods of economic crisis that we really see it start to flourish,” says Wrenn. Because many of the churches where it’s preached can be attended virtually, the message travels much further. “It’s a lot easier to have believers when you don’t have to physically be in a church. The portability of the message is what makes people believers in the prosperity gospel even when they’re not necessarily regular churchgoers.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xLxASs">
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The same could be said for the internet, where spiritual trends proliferate much like cultural and political ones. In fact, the latest iteration of New Thought’s founding principles is inseparable from the internet: Russo, the anthropology professor, notes that as social media has become the dominant cultural force in our society, ideologies are spreading between people who may have vastly different beliefs and backgrounds, but who show up on each other’s feeds and relate in new ways.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tDWyV4">
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“It’s a mishmash of different Christian and non- Western beliefs and aesthetics, but this stuff — good and evil, prosperity — are present in all religious systems worldwide, and always have been,” he says. “Even our most fervent atheists or agnostics are still interested in morality. It’s the same idea, different packaging.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UFkLXf">
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These binaries espoused by internet spirituality — good and evil, demonic and angelic, abundance and poverty — are reinforced everywhere in culture, and not only in the context of religion. “‘The demonic’ is one of those very superficial distinctions that really has a lot to do with, ‘who’s your customer? Who are you trying to frighten?’ It can stand in the kind of generalized force of evil in a very effective way, regardless of what the specifics are,” explains Russo. “It works on people not necessarily because they’ve read the Bible, but because they watch <em>Harry Potter</em> or read Tolkien or play Dungeons and Dragons.”
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</p></li>
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</ul>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jEKWw9">
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Juarez, the popular TikToker, joined the platform during a particularly difficult period in early 2019. She was forced to drop out of college, then began suffering from depression. After that, her husband was in a bad car accident. “I needed somebody to vent to,” she says. Though she was raised in a religious household, her beliefs differ from her parents in that she feels less connected to the ideas taught by the church, and more to Jesus himself. “I’ve noticed a lot of the younger generation looking for God in a different way,” she says, “They move away from their religious background and have an actual relationship with God.”
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</p>
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<div class="c-float-right">
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<aside id="QNXqxE">
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<q>“There’s a collective sense that the world is ending. It’s the only nonpartisan issue.”</q>
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</aside>
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</div>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="t7CUhv">
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Juarez’s TikTok comment section is proof in itself. “People have been like, ‘Yo, I can relate to this more than what I’ve been taught.’” Her approach to spirituality echoes many beliefs common in certain sects of Christianity — that occult practices shouldn’t be messed with, for instance (she doesn’t engage in manifestation because, she says, humans don’t always know what’s good for us: “I’ve dated a bunch of guys that now I know I shouldn’t have, but at the time thought they were the man of my dreams.”)
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tLCACC">
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<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@tofology?lang=en">Abbie Richards</a> is a 25-year-old disinformation researcher who creates TikToks about how conspiracy theories spread online and who regularly works with scholars to debunk and contextualize harmful myths. She’s watched how chaotic current events — the Astroworld tragedy, Covid-19, the <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/22673353/unemployment-job-search-linkedin-indeed-algorithm">confusing, broken job market</a> — have driven louder conversations around spirituality from TikTokers, no matter where they fall on the ideological or political spectrum. “There’s a collective sense that the world is ending, whether it’s climate change, whether it’s the rapture, the return of Jesus, wealth inequality, Satanic worship, or whether people’s ‘vibrations are too low,’” she says. “It’s the only nonpartisan issue.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bb9Ls2">
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When enormous swaths of people feel as though they have no power against evildoing, she argues, they tend to opt into narratives that provide a simple answer as to why the world is so terrifying. “With the case of Astroworld, the [organizers] didn’t do their due diligence, and they prioritized profit over the health and safety of humans. And that is a lonelier, grimmer thought to sit with than Travis Scott being a demonic villain.” It also lets us off the hook: “I totally empathize with why you would want to believe that you can fix capitalism by just wishing for money,” she says. “That’s so much easier than trying to implement taxes for the rich.”
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</p>
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<div id="DqZv1Z">
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<blockquote cite="https://www.tiktok.com/@tofology/video/7028740299484679429" class="tiktok-embed">
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<section>
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<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@tofology" target="_blank" title="@tofology"><span class="citation" data-cites="tofology">@tofology</span></a>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/astroworld" target="_blank" title="astroworld">#astroworld</a>
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</p>
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<a href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-7028740154584042246" target="_blank" title="♬ original sound - Abbie
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Richards ⛳️">♬ original sound - Abbie Richards ⛳️</a>
|
|||
|
|
</section>
|
|||
|
|
</blockquote>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Crodty">
|
|||
|
|
The internet offers endless answers to these kinds of questions, in part due to the way it functions. TikTok, for instance, facilitates a pipeline for viewers that begins the moment they log on, surfacing more and more content related to something they enjoyed in the past. Because of how short TikTok videos are — time is limited to three minutes but they’re often much shorter — viewers can consume 100 videos in the same time span as they could watch a single YouTube video. And naturally, the speed at which an idea travels correlates to its simplification: An exciting or provocative idea can draw someone in but not necessarily keep them around long enough to help them fully understand it.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="q8PFzB">
|
|||
|
|
In June, a TikToker named William Knight <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@grandrisingapp/video/6976320555070868741?amp%3Bsender_web_id=6900943631025178117&%3Bis_from_webapp=v1&%3Bis_copy_url=0&is_copy_url=0&is_from_webapp=v1&sender_device=pc&sender_web_id=6891259809896056326">posted a video</a> of himself staring intensely into the camera. “There is no such thing as a coincidence,” he says. “The fact that you’re watching this video means that you are energetically aligned with me and this message.” The bizarre video, which claimed that simply by stumbling upon the video means that you unconsciously manifested the desire to see it, <a href="https://www.insider.com/william-knight-tiktok-no-such-thing-as-a-coincidence-2021-7">quickly became the butt of a joke</a>, but Richards says she sees this kind of content go viral all the time. “They’re using the algorithm as evidence that the universe is ‘working,’ but it’s like, no, that’s ByteDance [TikTok’s parent company]. [These creators] game the algorithm and call it destiny.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zZM6nR">
|
|||
|
|
That human beings tend to organize our uncertainties within spiritual frameworks is not an inherently bad thing; it’s just that spirituality, when stewarded by humans, is subject to human impulses. “Religions need scapegoats in order to make distinctions between what’s good and bad,” Russo says. “This utopian idea of a new techno internet religion free of hatred won’t work without someone eventually saying, ‘I’m actually in charge of this.’ These kinds of conflicts emerge just by being with people and having to get along in life. We find ways of resolving, and sometimes they’re violent. But in this virtual world where maybe this church is forming, it’s not so easy to know how or when or why things are happening. There’s an irony because people are trying to establish order — this is what you can say, this is what you can’t say — but there are so many sub-factions and so many voices in the void.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="F2mwUq">
|
|||
|
|
It’s easy to point to QAnon, which some have argued <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/06/qanon-nothing-can-stop-what-is-coming/610567/">is itself its own religion</a>, as the worst-case scenario of internet spirituality. QAnon appeared to be led by a mysterious, prophetic figure, dropping vague omens and references to a coming battle of good and evil before over time becoming increasingly likely that Q, the supposed top-ranking official under President Trump, was actually just <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/04/05/ron-watkins-qanon-hbo/">the guy running the message board</a>. Despite the fact that none of Q’s predictions have come true, it barely matters: The roots of QAnon have already been seeded in American culture and politics; many believers now use the same fear-stoking online rumor campaigns to <a href="https://www.vox.com/22443822/critical-race-theory-controversy">cast antiracism as liberal propaganda</a> or <a href="https://www.vox.com/21504883/supreme-court-abortion-roe-v-wade-barrett">abortion as murder</a> and will certainly evolve to espouse the next reactionary ideology in the culture war.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<div class="c-float-right">
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="LuOghf">
|
|||
|
|
<q>“I don’t know that we’ve escaped the religious or sacred model of how to make sense of the world”</q>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="x6yEY3">
|
|||
|
|
But just as in mainstream religions, it’s impossible to judge a system of belief based on its most extremist or violent adherents. Believing wholeheartedly in illogical or unexplainable things is part of being a person, and not necessarily a bad one. Although it’s perfectly reasonable to view the current state of the world and remark that things do not seem to be going in a very positive direction, that total destruction is imminent whether it comes in five years or 500, many of us still cling to the arguably illogical hope that “good,” whatever your idea of it, will prevail. Prominent thinkers like Rebecca Solnit and Fareed Zakaria have advocated for <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/may/01/climate-change-environment-hope-future-
|
|||
|
|
optimism-success">optimism about the climate</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/vox-conversations-
|
|||
|
|
podcast/22586955/vox-conversations-fareed-zakaria-the-state-of-global-democracy">American democracy</a>, respectively, often noting that pessimism breeds apathy. “That we cannot see all the way to the transformed society we need does not mean it is impossible,” writes Solnit. “But only if we go actively towards the possibilities rather than passively into the collapse.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UsX0Ml">
|
|||
|
|
One of the more unfortunate tragedies of humanity is that we don’t know everything, and we never will, and therefore are destined to be guided by imperfect and varied systems of belief. “I don’t know that we’ve escaped the religious or sacred model of how to make sense of the world,” says Russo. “The irony is that you have it being espoused by people who are anti-religious.” Though their definitions will change, we will always hold onto warring ideas of good and evil, and those ideas will always have a distinctly spiritual bent regardless of where people fall on the spectrum of religiosity because they deal with questions of why we’re all here and what life is, well, for.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="cSZtBj">
|
|||
|
|
“I believe there’s good and evil,” Juarez tells me when I ask whether, in her video about the satanic symbolism of Astroworld, she was speaking literally or figuratively. “If someone is hurting and as a human being you don’t take action, that means you lack empathy and that doesn’t come from a good place. That, to me, is demonic.”
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p class="c-end-para" data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nfF9Ge">
|
|||
|
|
“That makes sense,” I tell her, and on a level I don’t quite understand but nonetheless feel, it does.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="pNT2Ng">
|
|||
|
|
<div>
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>Why is Vox Media buying Group Nine?</strong> -
|
|||
|
|
<figure>
|
|||
|
|
<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/UTLeUkqbTARusPCI_QQi0N129io=/148x0:5313x3874/1310x983/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70267530/1129460275.0.jpg"/>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Vox Media Ceo Jim Bankoff. | Rita Quinn/Getty Images for SXSW
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
The Vox Media-Group Nine deal — and all the other digital media deals — explained.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9OVn3S">
|
|||
|
|
Two weeks, two deals. And now four digital media companies are turning into two. Get ready for more of that.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ObLJXL">
|
|||
|
|
That’s the takeaway from Monday’s news that Vox Media — my employer — is close to acquiring Group Nine, the publisher behind outlets like The Dodo and NowThis. That deal announcement, first reported in the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/vox-media-in-advanced-talks-to-merge-with-group-nine-
|
|||
|
|
media-11639420533">Wall Street Journal</a> and then confirmed via a companywide email shortly after, comes days after BuzzFeed finished up buying Complex Networks, the publisher aimed at dudes who like hip-hop and sneakers.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Luxt1Z">
|
|||
|
|
The BuzzFeed-Complex deal came as <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/22819479/buzzfeed-spac-public-jonah-
|
|||
|
|
peretti-ipo-bzfd">BuzzFeed went public</a>, a move its CEO Jonah Peretti said he wanted to make because it would help him acquire more media companies. The new deal shows that you don’t have to be public to buy a media company: Vox is private, and so is Group Nine.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Jhv8qK">
|
|||
|
|
But the mechanics of the deal — we can talk about some of those in a minute — are less important than the big picture: Collectively, the men and women who run digital media companies have been talking about combining with each other for some time. The optimistic version of that pitch: <em>Combining equals more reach, more efficiency, more awesomeness</em>. The flip side: <em>If we don’t combine, we may not make it</em>.
|
|||
|
|
</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="R5y87C">
|
|||
|
|
And now the mashups are happening, one way or another.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qJjOmU">
|
|||
|
|
BuzzFeed, for instance, had already acquired HuffPost, the digital publisher Peretti had co-founded before launching his own company; he and Group Nine CEO Ben Lerer had previously talked about combining their two companies. Two years ago, Vox Media bought New York Magazine, and has been periodically picking up small media companies — last month, for instance, it picked up podcast studio <a href="https://www.voxmedia.com/2021/11/16/22785197/vox-media-acquires-criminal-productions-leading-narrative-
|
|||
|
|
podcast-studio">Criminal Productions</a>. Vice Media CEO Nancy Dubuc, who bought Refinery 29 in 2019, has also made it clear that <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/2/14/17013032/watch-full-interview-ae-nancy-dubuc-turner-john-martin-time-
|
|||
|
|
warner-att-code-media">she thinks her industry should consolidate</a>. And Dotdash, the digital publishing arm owned by Barry Diller’s IAC, just swallowed magazine publisher Meredith and its library of titles, including much of what used to be called Time Inc.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LuNSum">
|
|||
|
|
Wishing doesn’t make it so: The Athletic, the subscription-supported website focused on sports, has been looking for buyers for some time, but can’t find one that will pay the price it wants. Axios, the newsletter publisher created by veterans from Politico, was in talks with German publisher Axel Springer before that deal fell through.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="P3SoDd">
|
|||
|
|
And Group Nine itself wanted to acquire other companies. At the beginning of this year, it had created <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/22303457/spacs-explained-stock-market-ipo-
|
|||
|
|
draftkings">a blank-check SPAC company</a> — the same mechanism BuzzFeed used to go public and buy Complex. Monday’s news seems to be an admission that Group Nine couldn’t find a company it wanted to buy, or that wanted to be acquired. (Now Group Nine’s ownership stake in that SPAC will transfer over to Vox Media, which could then do … something with it.)
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7hrdFs">
|
|||
|
|
The throughline for all these deals — real and proposed — is scale: Get big enough, the rationale goes, and it makes it easier to sell ads, or subscriptions, or both. And at this point in the pitch you’re supposed to mention the looming digital media duopoly of Google and Facebook, and argue that consolidation is an antidote to that. But to be clear: It’s not as though all of these companies combined would be actual competitors to either Google or Facebook; it’s just that having bigger audiences makes it easier to attract more ad dollars, period — or for subscription-based companies, bigger companies have more stuff to sell.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6sfkNM">
|
|||
|
|
So if consolidation helps those publishers survive, then … good? Yes, consolidating publishers means that some titles and brands you like are likely to get merged out of existence. But hopefully more will survive this way than they would on their own.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RFRfi2">
|
|||
|
|
As far as the announcement details go: This is an all-stock deal, meaning investors in Group Nine — which include Discovery, the cable programmer that’s trying to acquire Warner Media — will end up with a 25 percent stake in Vox Media. Vox Media, meanwhile, has already taken investment money from Comcast. So two of the biggest media companies in the world could end up with stakes in the same digital media operation — though I’m not sure either one of them cares much about that.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="f9bEXq">
|
|||
|
|
And while Vox Media CEO Jim Bankoff told us in a company email Monday that he has “no immediate plans to go public,” this is very much the kind of deal you make as a precursor to going public: The Wall Street Journal reports that Vox Media, if this acquisition goes through, will do $700 million in revenue next year, with $100 million in profit; BuzzFeed is projecting similar numbers for itself.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="cnEjDw">
|
|||
|
|
Beyond sheer bulk, the eventual pitch to investors would be the one the company wants to start making to advertisers as soon as possible: <em>We’ve got stuff for everybody</em>. I surveyed some of Vox’s competitors on Monday and heard more than a bit of shit-talking about the assets the company is about to acquire: “You’re buying a pet site,” sniffed one executive. But if people want to buy ads on that <a href="https://www.thedodo.com/">pet site</a>, and that pet site’s revenues help keep me employed, I’m not going to complain.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li><strong>Nothing changed and everything changed in Succession’s third season</strong> -
|
|||
|
|
<figure>
|
|||
|
|
<img alt="Kieran Culkin and Sarah Snook, looking quite dapper, walk through a lovely garden." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/balTRWkZHyhzl1_AyShwHD5e5W8=/0x0:1739x1304/1310x983/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70265845/kieran_culkin_sarah_snook.0.jpg"/>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Roman and Shiv prepare for their mother’s wedding. | Graeme Hunter/HBO
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
|
The one scene that sums up a messily perfect season.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0HzZSz">
|
|||
|
|
<a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/22691830/succession-season-3-hbo-review-
|
|||
|
|
roy-logan-kendall-shiv-roman"><em>Succession</em></a> is about abuse.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7NezIp">
|
|||
|
|
Yes, you could point to ways the show is about power or wealth or family, but every single one of those themes winds its way, eventually, back to the fact that <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/22777228/succession-episode-5-season-3-recap-review-retired-janitors-of-
|
|||
|
|
idaho-logan-abuse">Logan Roy is an abusive parent to his four children</a> and that Logan himself was abused as a child. The world is doomed because it is run by men like Logan, who believe that the only truth is that everybody is out to get you and that paranoia is the only rational response to the world.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YooLgg">
|
|||
|
|
Logan says late in the third season finale “All the Bells Say” that he is screwing over his children because he wants to teach them something about how the world works. He seems to be talking about how selling the company out from under his kids will force them to grapple with “reality,” with the way that nobody is looking out for you, by kicking them out of the nest and making them face some harsh truths.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RnALzX">
|
|||
|
|
But the person who isn’t looking out for them is Logan, their own father. Kendall, Roman, and Shiv try to present a united front against him, and when he’s unable to peel Roman off from the other two, he erupts almost as badly as he has at any point in the show’s run.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dFeULd">
|
|||
|
|
Just before the three go in to confront their father, Roman nods to the idea that his father’s physical abuse of him — as seen in the form of a slap in the show’s second season — has a long, long history that his siblings seem to have mostly ignored or blocked out. Neither Ken nor Shiv remembers when they abandoned Roman to squirt their father with a water pistol alone, which seems to have had dire consequences:
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<img alt="“I went in and you fucks left me
|
|||
|
|
for dead,” Roman says." src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/lljRzrv5BVoZ9_0RNz5GNqbhZz4=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23083815/Screen_Shot_2021_12_12_at_7.53.34_PM.png"/> <cite>HBO</cite></figure></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Roman tells Kendall and Shiv about the aftermath of the water pistol incident.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kssRzQ">
|
|||
|
|
So what’s the path out of this labyrinth? How do you escape a cycle of abuse so large that it seems to have swallowed society? “All the Bells Say” has an answer to that question. It just might not be where you’re looking for it.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h3 id="BAgwjk">
|
|||
|
|
The scene that best explains “All the Bells Say”
|
|||
|
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OjZbtl">
|
|||
|
|
The core of “All the Bells Say” is a long, long scene featuring just Kendall, Roman, and Shiv. It lasts nearly nine minutes — an eternity in television, where scenes usually try to stay concise, and even an eternity on<em> Succession</em>, which tends to have longer scenes than most. Kendall’s <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2021/12/7/22822667/succession-
|
|||
|
|
episode-8-season-3-chiantishire-kendall-recap-dead">near-death in the pool</a> from the end of the previous episode has been handled mostly poorly by his siblings, who stage reluctant interventions and offer mockery. But to stop the deal their father seems to be striking with tech company Gojo, Roman and Shiv need Kendall on their side. So they approach him at their mother’s wedding to ask him for his help.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rTCrKt">
|
|||
|
|
The three retreat to an area just beyond the wedding festivities, where the ground is caked in clay. Wind whips dirt into the air, and Shiv and Roman just want to talk business. When they suggest Kendall might have his own angle, though, that he might have gone around everyone to form some sort of outside deal with Gojo, Kendall just laughs. He is a man who <em>nearly died</em> just a couple of days ago, possibly by suicide. He is not someone who has been carrying out corporate skullduggery.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iLl4Ar">
|
|||
|
|
He sinks to the ground, and director Mark Mylod cuts to one of the show’s signature wide shots.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="Kendall (in the foreground) sits in the dirt. Shiv stands close to him, and Roman
|
|||
|
|
(slightly out of focus) stands further away." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/_nbCUHlCGn5IOMUtAIu-
|
|||
|
|
AWiBGBA=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23083835/Screen_Shot_2021_12_12_at_8.07.22_PM.png"/> <cite>HBO</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Kendall, Shiv, and Roman have a little chat.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Ji9WR2">
|
|||
|
|
As the scene continues, Kendall stays rooted in place on the ground, the white clay slowly staining his dark brown pants. (The New Yorker’s Michael Schulman reports this was something actor Jeremy Strong <a href="https://twitter.com/MJSchulman/status/1470235702994554884">decided to do on the spur of the moment</a>, even though sitting on the ground ruined the continuity of nine other takes.)
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sdaUN4">
|
|||
|
|
But Shiv and Roman move back and forth between either crouching or sitting beside Kendall and standing. When they get on Kendall’s level, they talk to him in a way that acknowledges the dark emotions he’s experiencing; when they stand, they become more interested in their father’s business dealings. As Roman becomes more involved in Kendall’s situation, he moves closer to him, just as Shiv moves further away to take a phone call related to the deal. The scene is a master class in how to block actors to enhance a scene’s subtext.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="Shiv crouches beside Kendall, as Roman
|
|||
|
|
moves out of the background." src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/EfeXxdupudVMtgiQM-3rt9I3aYg=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23083841/Screen_Shot_2021_12_12_at_8.23.07_PM.png"/> <cite>HBO</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Shiv is getting down on Kendall’s level. Roman is moving closer.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="Kendall and Roman stoop in the dirt. Shiv stands up on the phone." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/K3Efo41g3yHWs7ZrDk3F2fvoAjY=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23083843/Screen_Shot_2021_12_12_at_8.26.37_PM.png"/> <cite>HBO</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Now Roman is on Kendall’s level, while Shiv takes a call related to the deal in the background. (Note how she’s out of focus. The deal is no longer what the scene is about.)
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WvmHFX">
|
|||
|
|
Lots of <em>Succession</em> commentators — <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2021/12/7/22822667/succession-
|
|||
|
|
episode-8-season-3-chiantishire-kendall-recap-dead">including me</a> — speculated that “All the Bells Say” would feature Kendall coming clean about being responsible for the death of a waiter in the show’s first-season finale, something that Logan covered up for his son. But that speculation usually pegged the “coming clean” bit as involving him confessing to a journalist or true-crime podcast or something. Instead, he came clean to his siblings.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="oDsnSz">
|
|||
|
|
<div>
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="edAlee">
|
|||
|
|
As the scene begins, it’s clear Kendall is hanging on by the slimmest of threads. He feels disconnected from his family, his work, himself. His revelation of what he did forces his siblings to stop caring so much about the deal and start relating to him on a human level. It also shifts the dramatic action of the scene. No longer is this a scene about whether Shiv, Roman, and Kendall will present a united front or whether the former two can badger their brother into backing some sort of play to stop their father selling the company. Instead, it’s a scene about whether Shiv and Roman can find a way to reach Kendall in his heightened state of depression and guilt. Ultimately, they do.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="TunQju">
|
|||
|
|
What’s notable about this scene is that what finally works has almost nothing to do with what Shiv and Roman say and everything to do with how they behave. Roman never stops making wisecracks about how Kendall isn’t as responsible as he claims he is and how everybody’s killed a kid or two and how he couldn’t get a decent gin and tonic after the waiter’s death, but those jokes only land once he physically sits down next to Kendall (and in the process gets his own pants covered in clay).
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="Kendall finally laughs genuinely at one of Roman’s jokes, as Roman finally sits right next to him in the dirt." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/amu3sjvhAn8YcaUilgxZGurvoIs=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23083859/Screen_Shot_2021_12_12_at_8.34.36_PM.png"/> <cite>HBO</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Kendall can still smile!
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jv0opY">
|
|||
|
|
The three of them eventually leave to try to stop their dad’s deal. They fail. Of course they fail. The odds are always against them when their father is involved. But they are, for the first time in ages and ages, together<em>. </em>And that’s the key to what follows.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<h3 id="XBJXS7">
|
|||
|
|
In <em>Succession</em>’s third season, nothing changed. But everything changed, too.
|
|||
|
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AoGvak">
|
|||
|
|
I want to be careful in stating that the Roys are “together” and making it sound like they have suddenly become good people. What empathy they feel for each other in this episode (if any) is at least partially driven by the self-interest each has in taking over the family business. Roman correctly notes in the car ride over to where the deal is going down that if their attempted coup had been successful, they would have immediately started sniping at each other. They probably will start immediately sniping at each other the second season four begins. These are not people capable of very much growth.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0jWZgg">
|
|||
|
|
What’s more, Kendall, Roman, and Shiv might finally be on the same page with each other, but they continue to casually hurt many other people. They seem taken aback by Connor’s sudden emotional outburst at the breakfast intervention the siblings hold for Kendall, when the series’ backstory includes references to Connor being their protector before becoming estranged from everyone due to Logan’s interference. Kendall’s treatment of Greg earlier in the season led to Greg returning to the warm embrace of Tom, who was about to betray his own wife. And Roman continued to send Gerri pictures of his penis after she had told him not to, which nearly resulted in her being fired.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QuqevR">
|
|||
|
|
Shiv’s treatment of Tom is particularly important in this regard. She’s spent all season avoiding his obvious anxiety over potentially having to go to prison, and her inability to have a simple conversation about why she maybe doesn’t want kids right now kept threatening to blow up into a whole thing. This arc culminated in the season’s penultimate episode, when some cruel talk in the name of (intentionally) spicing up foreplay concluded with her telling him that she doesn’t love him, something that seems true but which she brushed off as no big deal. Tom’s betrayal of Shiv is treated as a momentous act, but mostly because the show situates us in the perspective of Shiv when it happens. Seen from his point of view, it’s a rational response to a woman who takes him for granted and arguably emotionally abuses him.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="Tom holds Shiv by the
|
|||
|
|
shoulders as she has a big revelation." src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/3yD63i6lYCsVizs9eGse2935fGA=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23085008/matthew_macfadyen_sarah_snook.jpg"/> <cite>Graeme Hunter/HBO</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Tom comforts Shiv, immediately after she realizes he betrayed her.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kApBW3">
|
|||
|
|
So, no, I don’t think the Roys have empathy, nor do I think they’ve experienced much in the way of character growth. What they have found, instead, is solidarity in the face of their father’s abuses, and that might be enough to keep their fledgling alliance together.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7loOxi">
|
|||
|
|
The promotional materials for <em>Succession</em>’s third season were largely head fakes toward a grand war between Kendall and Logan. But that war had mostly fizzled out by the end of the season’s second episode when Kendall’s siblings refused to join his quest to take down their dad. (Go back and <a href="https://www.vox.com/22715408/succession-season-3-episode-2-recap-review-mass-in-time-of-war-doughnuts-
|
|||
|
|
kendall">watch that episode</a>. It’s remarkable just how much Kendall’s pitch for the future of Waystar-Royco matches what Mattson, the tech CEO of Gojo, pitches to Logan. Kendall really did know what he was doing.)
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="ta6tIq">
|
|||
|
|
<div>
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WJyCy3">
|
|||
|
|
That head fake led to some complaints that the show was just endlessly repeating itself. To me, that was the season’s point: The Roy kids are all battling endlessly over something that ultimately doesn’t matter, because their dad likes pitting them against each other and they are too traumatized to see that. All the same, I could see the argument that the show was somehow <a href="https://slate.com/culture/2021/10/succession-season-3-hbo-drama-sitcom.html">turning itself into a fatuous sitcom</a> where absolutely nothing mattered.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="82SPPd">
|
|||
|
|
What’s notable about “All the Bells Say” is that within it, several big changes seem to occur. Logan is proceeding with the deal with Gojo, cutting his children not just out of the deal but out of the financial windfall it will afford him (and only him). The siblings’ mother betrays them. Tom betrays Shiv. Willa says she’ll marry Connor (who gets the most sincere moments of screen time he probably ever has). Greg is maybe going to become king of Luxembourg.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="uktOta">
|
|||
|
|
But the season preceding this episode underscores that none of this will ultimately matter. The logic of money means that Gojo will keep following the horrifying turn toward bigotry that Waystar’s flagship news network has undertaken. (When Gojo head Matsson says, “Some of your content is cool,” it’s hard to believe he’s talking about the company’s news division. But it makes money.) Waystar will have new people at its head, but that won’t matter. The siblings knew their mom wasn’t to be trusted. Shiv and Tom already have a tumultuous marriage. Willa doesn’t have to give up her life of leisure. And, okay, if Greg becomes king of Luxembourg, that’s a perfect premise for a sitcom spinoff.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="k1Xcfu">
|
|||
|
|
Nothing changed in season three of <em>Succession</em>. Nothing will change in season four of <em>Succession</em>. This show has taught us how to watch it by this point.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0AdzaP">
|
|||
|
|
Except everything changed in season three of <em>Succession</em>.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="G6Qo8n">
|
|||
|
|
Sometimes the only way for familial abuse survivors to stand up to their abuser is to present a united front. And the subconscious strategy of the abuser is usually to turn the survivors against each other. Logan tries to do this several times in the episode’s final scene. He mocks Shiv and tries to get Roman to abandon his siblings in the name of helping Logan. But for the first time, none of the three caves. The support they extended Kendall in the clay outside their mother’s wedding ripples through all three of them, to the degree that even Roman, usually the weak link, stands strong in the face of his father’s manipulation.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Hv8TDM">
|
|||
|
|
Logan, finally, turns to the last tactic in his box: He yells at them. He berates them. He tries to get them so scared of him that they turn against each other. But it doesn’t work. So he reveals that his kids have no cards left to play. They’re fucked. But through it all, they’re together.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pnsvil">
|
|||
|
|
As Logan exits the scene, Roman stops him. He had hoped, he says, that maybe Logan would deal with them out of love. Logan mocks the idea. What good is love? Reality doesn’t have room for love. The world is built by people who squash those who believe love is worth anything at all.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oUgHvb">
|
|||
|
|
Parents are supposed to love their children, right? It’s one of those values so hard-coded into our societies that we almost take it for granted. We know, though, <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/22784054/estrangement-family-friends-
|
|||
|
|
friendsgiving">how often parents don’t love their children</a>, and we know how often parents put their own self- interest ahead of their kids’ futures. <em>Succession</em>’s argument extends this core sadness out to an entire species and an entire planet.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<aside id="VU7LZi">
|
|||
|
|
<div>
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
</div>
|
|||
|
|
</aside>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="BNopBz">
|
|||
|
|
But we keep believing anyway. The children of abusers hope that, finally, their parents might see them and love them, and <em>Succession</em> puts us in the shoes of abuse survivors over and over again, as they hope that Logan will just turn some corner and do the right thing. But we know he won’t. He can’t. He’s too far gone. Sometimes, parents don’t love their children. This is one of those times.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UmGZMZ">
|
|||
|
|
So you find love elsewhere. And what changes in season three of <em>Succession</em> is that Kendall, Roman, and Shiv finally realize they have each other. Nothing has changed; everything has changed.
|
|||
|
|
</p>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="Roman puts his hands on Kendall’s shoulders, while Shiv puts her hand on his
|
|||
|
|
head." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/-qpS06gJ489wTOXaoc3CO8mD_Ko=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23083896/Screen_Shot_2021_12_12_at_8.51.15_PM.png"/> <cite>HBO</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
Roman and Shiv comfort Kendall after his confession of guilt …
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<figure class="e-image">
|
|||
|
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="Kendall puts his hands on Roman’s shoulders." src="https://cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/thumbor/PcWe_WDQGXdCHLLyLcj3xOIVxQk=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
|||
|
|
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23083898/Screen_Shot_2021_12_12_at_9.00.42_PM.png"/> <cite>HBO</cite></p>
|
|||
|
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
… and Kendall comforts Roman in the same way after their father berates them.
|
|||
|
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Virat Kohli has made no official request for break as of now: BCCI official</strong> - Kohli will be leading India in a three-Test series starting December 26 in Centurion and the series ends on January 15 in Cape Town with the third and final Test.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Indian pairs bow out of World badminton championship</strong> - Venkat Gaurav Prasad and Juhi Dewangan suffered loss in straight games</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>PSG vs Real Madrid in blockbuster Champions League clash</strong> - UEFA left embarrassed after a foul-up in first draw</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>ISL 2021 | HFC too good for NEUFC</strong> - Slams five goals past the hapless North-East side</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>La Liga | Real strolls to victory in Madrid derby</strong> - Wins helps tighten top spot in LaLiga</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Belarus: Opposition leader Tikhanovsky jailed for 18 years over protests</strong> - Sergei Tikhanovsky, a former presidential candidate, is convicted after a trial condemned as a sham.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Two detained after UK boat’s fatal collision off Sweden</strong> - One person is dead and one missing after a Danish ship collides with a UK vessel in the Baltic Sea.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>UK to unveil Human Rights Act reform proposals</strong> - Measures commit to staying within the European Convention - despite pressure from some Conservatives.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Koffi Olomidé cleared of rape but convicted of holding dancers</strong> - A French court clears Koffi Olomidé of rape but convicts him of holding four dancers against their will.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Inger Stoejberg: Jail for Danish ex-minister for asylum separations</strong> - Inger Stoejberg faces 60 days in prison for separating young asylum-seeking couples in 2016.</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</h1>
|
|||
|
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Win hardware, collectibles, and more in the 2021 Ars Technica Charity Drive</strong> - Help yourself to prizes by helping us raise money for good causes. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1819712">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>“The situation is critical”: Minnesota hospitals beg people to get vaccinated</strong> - “How can we as a society stand by and watch people die?” - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1820362">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>iOS 15.2 and macOS 12.1 add several previously delayed features</strong> - SharePlay comes to macOS, and the new Apple Music plan comes to everything. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1818662">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Logitech G303 Shroud Edition review: $130 wireless mouse for big-handed gamers</strong> - New G303 wireless gaming mouse improves on original, but its shape isn’t a universal fit. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1818672">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Here’s how much Hyundai’s cool, new Ioniq 5 EV will cost</strong> - It starts at $39,700 for 220 miles of range or $43,650 for the 303-mile version. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1820124">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
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<li><strong>A wealthy lawyer was riding in his limousine when he saw two women along the roadside eating grass.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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A wealthy lawyer was riding in his limousine when he saw two women along the roadside eating grass. Disturbed, he ordered his driver to stop and he got out to investigate. He asked one women, “Why are you eating grass?” “We don’t have any money for food,” the poor women replied. “We have to eat grass.” “Well then, you can come with me to my house and I’ll feed you,” the lawyer said. “But sir, I have a husband and two children with me. They are over there, under that tree.” “Bring them along,” the lawyer replied. Turning to the other poor women he stated, “You come with us also.” The second women, in a pitiful voice then said, “But sir, I also have a husband and SIX children with me!” “Bring them all, as well,” the lawyer answered. They all entered the car, which was no easy task, even for a car as large as the limousine. Once underway, one of the poor fellows turned to the lawyer and said, “Sir, you are too kind. Thank you for taking all of us with you.” The lawyer replied, “Glad to do it. You’ll really love my place; the grass is almost a foot high!”
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/IchSkill"> /u/IchSkill </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rfvw9q/a_wealthy_lawyer_was_riding_in_his_limousine_when/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rfvw9q/a_wealthy_lawyer_was_riding_in_his_limousine_when/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>Why don’t blind people Skydive?</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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It scares the shit out of the guide dog
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/BonelessBuffalo83"> /u/BonelessBuffalo83 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rftq8m/why_dont_blind_people_skydive/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rftq8m/why_dont_blind_people_skydive/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>My wife sued for divorce because she said I couldn’t get an erection.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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I had hard evidence to the contrary, but it wouldn’t stand up in court.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Neptune23456"> /u/Neptune23456 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rfmdm9/my_wife_sued_for_divorce_because_she_said_i/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rfmdm9/my_wife_sued_for_divorce_because_she_said_i/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>I’ve read that excessive sex causes memory loss:</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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It was in the British Medical Journal in May last year, page 12, paragraph 3. A nice sunny day I was reading in the park …
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/AdeptLengthiness8886"> /u/AdeptLengthiness8886 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rfde7d/ive_read_that_excessive_sex_causes_memory_loss/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rfde7d/ive_read_that_excessive_sex_causes_memory_loss/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>I nibbled on my 3 year olds ear and said “I’m going to eat your ears”. She said “Papa! No! Don’t eat my ears!”</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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“My mask will fall off!”
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</p>
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(True story from yesterday, happy end of 2021!)
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/sixtimesthree"> /u/sixtimesthree </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rft6cj/i_nibbled_on_my_3_year_olds_ear_and_said_im_going/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/rft6cj/i_nibbled_on_my_3_year_olds_ear_and_said_im_going/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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</ul>
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