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<title>Covid-19 Sentry</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"/><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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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="covid-19-sentry">Covid-19 Sentry</h1>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
<ul>
<li><a href="#from-preprints">From Preprints</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-clinical-trials">From Clinical Trials</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-pubmed">From PubMed</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-patent-search">From Patent Search</a></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-preprints">From Preprints</h1>
<ul>
<li><strong>Antigenic cartography using hamster sera identifies SARS-CoV-2 JN.1 evasion seen in human XBB.1.5 booster sera</strong> -
<div>
Antigenic assessments of SARS-CoV-2 variants inform decisions to update COVID-19 vaccines. Primary infection sera are often used for assessments, but such sera are rare due to population immunity from SARS-CoV-2 infections and COVID-19 vaccinations. Here, we show that neutralization titers and breadth of matched human and hamster pre-Omicron variant primary infection sera correlate well and generate similar antigenic maps. The hamster antigenic map shows modest antigenic drift among XBB sub-lineage variants, with JN.1 and BA.4/BA.5 variants within the XBB cluster, but with five to six-fold antigenic differences between these variants and XBB.1.5. Compared to sera following only ancestral or bivalent COVID-19 vaccinations, or with post-vaccination infections, XBB.1.5 booster sera had the broadest neutralization against XBB sub-lineage variants, although a five-fold titer difference was still observed between JN.1 and XBB.1.5 variants. These findings suggest that antibody coverage of antigenically divergent JN.1 could be improved with a matched vaccine antigen.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.05.588359v1" target="_blank">Antigenic cartography using hamster sera identifies SARS-CoV-2 JN.1 evasion seen in human XBB.1.5 booster sera</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Care-full Collectives and their Care Practices</strong> -
<div>
In my dissertation, I examine different collectives and their practices through different applied theories of care and theorize on new organizational structures and rituals. This is a study of how people came together during the first wave of Covid-19, myself included. It studies these coming-togethers through different “do-ings” and “be–ings” and juxtaposes them with different theories of care. Theories that include Annemarie Mol’s “Logic of Care”, Ella Myers’ “Worldly things”, Jenna Grant’s “Repair as Care”, Sara Ahmed’s “Fragile Connections” and Lucy Suchman’s “Relocating Innovation”. These different theories come from places like medical anthropology, STS, queer theory, and more. I give an honest account of my journey through these collectives and these theories. I also start to propose an alternate way of organizing institutions for mutual aid through two tools - archetypes and axioms.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://osf.io/ds39u/" target="_blank">Care-full Collectives and their Care Practices</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Incidence and risk factors of omicron variant SARS-CoV-2 breakthrough infection among vaccinated and boosted individuals.</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Background: SARS-CoV-2 vaccines have been shown to be safe and effective against infection and severe COVID-19 disease worldwide. Certain co-morbid conditions cause immune dysfunction and may reduce immune response to vaccination.  In contrast, those with co-morbidities may practice infection prevention strategies. Thus, the real-world clinical impact of co-morbidities on SARS-CoV-2 infection in the recent post-vaccination period is not well established. We performed this study to understand the epidemiology of Omicron breakthrough infection and evaluate associations with number of comorbidities in a vaccinated and boosted population.  Methods and Findings: We performed a retrospective clinical cohort study utilizing the Northwestern Medicine Enterprise Data Warehouse.  Our study population was identified as fully vaccinated adults with at least one booster. The primary risk factor of interest was the number of co-morbidities.  Our primary outcome was incidence and time to first positive SARS-CoV-2 molecular test in the Omicron predominant era. We performed multivariable analyses stratified by calendar time using Cox modeling to determine hazard of SARS-CoV-2.  In total, 133,191 patients were analyzed. Having 3+ comorbidities was associated with increased hazard for breakthrough (HR=1.2 CI 1.2-1.6). During the second half of the study, having 2 comorbidities (HR= 1.1 95% CI 1.02-1.2) and having 3+ comorbidities (HR 1.7, 95% CI 1.5-1.9) were associated with increased hazard for Omicron breakthrough. Older age was associated with decreased hazard in the first 6 months of follow-up. Interaction terms for calendar time indicated significant changes in hazard for many factors between the first and second halves of the follow-up period. Conclusions: Omicron breakthrough is common with significantly higher risk for our most vulnerable patients with multiple co-morbidities. Age related behavioral factors play an important role in breakthrough infection with the highest incidence among young adults. Our findings reflect real-world differences in immunity and exposure risk behaviors for populations vulnerable to COVID-19.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.03.24305293v1" target="_blank">Incidence and risk factors of omicron variant SARS-CoV-2 breakthrough infection among vaccinated and boosted individuals.</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>The Constructive and Destructive Power of Social Norms in the Presence of Authoritative Influence</strong> -
<div>
A randomized survey experiment (N=2,868) was conducted at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic to examine the effects of information provision on individuals’ cooperation with social distancing measures. Employing a 2 × 2 factorial design, the study examined the influence of social comparison and a powerful messenger. Using an online sample of approximately 3,000 Japanese respondents, it was found that participants demonstrated greater cooperation with social distancing measures when they perceived that they had spent a relatively <em>long</em> time outside the home compared with prevailing social norms in the previous week. Conversely, individuals who spent a relatively <em>short</em> time outside the home, exhibited the opposite effect. However, these results were observed solely in conjunction with the influence of a powerful messenger. The study also explored heterogeneous responses based on personality traits. In conclusion, the results highlight the challenges of changing behavior through informational interventions, emphasizing the role of both the characteristics of the sender and recipient of the information.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/rsbmz/" target="_blank">The Constructive and Destructive Power of Social Norms in the Presence of Authoritative Influence</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Distinct Type 1 Immune Networks Underlie the Severity of Restrictive Lung Disease after COVID-19</strong> -
<div>
The variable etiology of persistent breathlessness after COVID-19 have confounded efforts to decipher the immunopathology of lung sequelae. Here, we analyzed hundreds of cellular and molecular features in the context of discrete pulmonary phenotypes to define the systemic immune landscape of post-COVID lung disease. Cluster analysis of lung physiology measures highlighted two phenotypes of restrictive lung disease that differed by their impaired diffusion and severity of fibrosis. Machine learning revealed marked CCR5+CD95+ CD8+ T-cell perturbations in mild-to-moderate lung disease, but attenuated T-cell responses hallmarked by elevated CXCL13 in more severe disease. Distinct sets of cells, mediators, and autoantibodies distinguished each restrictive phenotype, and differed from those of patients without significant lung involvement. These differences were reflected in divergent T-cell-based type 1 networks according to severity of lung disease. Our findings, which provide an immunological basis for active lung injury versus advanced disease after COVID-19, might offer new targets for treatment.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.03.587929v1" target="_blank">Distinct Type 1 Immune Networks Underlie the Severity of Restrictive Lung Disease after COVID-19</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Within-host genetic diversity of SARS-CoV-2 across animal species</strong> -
<div>
Infectious disease transmission to different host species makes eradication very challenging and expands the diversity of evolutionary trajectories taken by the pathogen. Since the beginning of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, SARS-CoV-2 has been transmitted from humans to many different animal species, and viral variants of concern could potentially evolve in a non-human animal. Previously, using available whole genome consensus sequences of SARS-CoV-2 from four commonly sampled animals (mink, deer, cat, and dog) we inferred similar numbers of transmission events from humans to each animal species but a relatively high number of transmission events from mink back to humans (Naderi et al., 2023). Using a genome-wide association study (GWAS), we identified 26 single nucleotide variants (SNVs) that tend to occur in deer – more than any other animal – suggesting a high rate of viral adaptation to deer. Here we quantify intra-host SARS-CoV-2 across animal species and show that deer harbor more intra-host SNVs (iSNVs) than other animals, providing a larger pool of genetic diversity for natural selection to act upon. Within-host diversity is particularly high in deer lymph nodes compared to nasopharyngeal samples, suggesting tissue-specific differences in viral population sizes or selective pressures. Neither mixed infections involving more than one viral lineage nor large changes in the strength of selection are likely to explain the higher intra-host diversity within deer. Rather, deer are more likely to contain larger viral population sizes, to be infected for longer periods of time, or to be systematically sampled at later stages of infections. Combined with extensive deer-to-deer transmission, the high levels of within-deer viral diversity help explain the apparent rapid adaptation of SARS-CoV-2 to deer.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.03.587973v1" target="_blank">Within-host genetic diversity of SARS-CoV-2 across animal species</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Exploration of the link between COVID-19 and gastric cancer from the perspective of bioinformatics and systems biology</strong> -
<div>
Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), an infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), has caused a global pandemic. Gastric cancer (GC) poses a great threat to people's health, which is a high-risk factor for COVID-19. Previous studies have found some associations between GC and COVID-19, whereas the underlying molecular mechanisms are not well understood. Methods: We used a bioinformatics and systems biology approach to investigate the relationship between GC and COVID-19. The gene expression profiles of COVID-19 (GSE196822) and GC (GSE179252) were downloaded from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database. After identifying the shared differentially expressed genes (DEGs) for GC and COVID-19, functional annotation, protein-protein interaction (PPI) network, hub genes, transcriptional regulatory networks and candidate drugs were analyzed. Results: A total of 209 shared DEGs were identified to explore the linkages between COVID-19 and GC. Functional analyses showed that Immune-related pathway collectively participated in the development and progression of COVID-19 and GC. In addition, there are selected 10 hub genes including CDK1, KIF20A, TPX2, UBE2C, HJURP, CENPA, PLK1, MKI67, IFI6, and IFIT2. The transcription factor/gene and miRNA/gene interaction networks identified 38 transcription factors (TFs) and 234 miRNAs. More importantly, we identified ten potential therapeutic agents, including ciclopirox, resveratrol, etoposide, methotrexate, trifluridine, enterolactone, troglitazone, calcitriol, dasatinib and deferoxamine, some of which have been reported to improve and treat GC and COVID-19. This study also provides insight into the diseases most associated with mutual DEGs, which may provide new ideas for research on the treatment of COVID-19. Conclusions: This research has the possibility to be contributed to effective therapeutic in COVID-19 and GC.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.03.587916v1" target="_blank">Exploration of the link between COVID-19 and gastric cancer from the perspective of bioinformatics and systems biology</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Discovery of orally bioavailable SARS-CoV-2 papain-like protease inhibitor as a potential treatment for COVID-19</strong> -
<div>
The RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp), 3C-like protease (3CLpro), and papain-like protease (PLpro) are pivotal components in the viral life cycle of SARS-CoV-2, presenting as promising therapeutic targets. Currently, all FDA-approved antiviral drugs against SARS-CoV-2 are RdRp or 3CLpro inhibitors. However, the mutations causing drug resistance have been observed in RdRp and 3CLpro from SARS-CoV-2, which makes it necessary to develop antivirals with novel mechanisms. Through the application of a structure-based drug design (SBDD) approach, we discovered a series of novel potent non-covalent PLpro inhibitors with remarkable in vitro potency and in vivo PK properties. The co-crystal structures of PLpro with leads revealed that the residues E164 and Q269 around the S2 site are critical for improving the inhibitor's potency. The lead compound GZNL-P36 not only inhibited SARS-CoV-2 and its variants at the cellular level with EC50 ranging from 58.2 nM to 306.2 nM, but also inhibited HCoV-NL63 and HCoV-229E with EC50 of 81.6 nM and 2.66 M, respectively. Oral administration of the compound resulted in significantly improved survival and notable reductions in lung viral loads and lesions in SARS-CoV-2 infection mouse model, consistent with RNA-seq data analysis. Our results indicate that PLpro inhibitor is a promising SARS-CoV-2 therapy.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.03.587743v1" target="_blank">Discovery of orally bioavailable SARS-CoV-2 papain-like protease inhibitor as a potential treatment for COVID-19</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Comparative analysis of serological assays and sero-surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 exposure in US cattle</strong> -
<div>
Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) continues to pose a significant threat to public health globally. Notably, SARS-CoV-2 demonstrates a unique capacity to infect various non-human animal species, documented in captive and free-living animals. However, experimental studies revealed low susceptibility of domestic cattle (Bos taurus) to ancestral B.1 lineage SARS-CoV-2 infection, with limited viral replication and seroconversion. Despite the emergence of viral variants with potentially altered host tropism, recent experimental findings indicate greater permissiveness of cattle to SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant infection compared to other variants, though with limited seroconversion and no clear evidence of transmission. While some studies detected SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in cattle in Italy and Germany, there is no evidence of natural SARS-CoV-2 infection in cattle from the United States or elsewhere. Since serological tests have inherent problems of false positives and negatives, we conducted a comprehensive assessment of multiple serological assays on over 600 cattle serum samples, including pre-pandemic and pandemic cattle sera. We found that SARS-CoV-2 pseudovirus neutralization assays with a luciferase reporter system can produce false positive results, and care must be taken to interpret serological diagnosis using these assays. We found no serological evidence of natural SARS-CoV-2 infection or transmission among cattle in the USA. Hence, it is critical to develop more reliable serological assays tailored to accurately detect SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in cattle populations and rigorously evaluate diagnostic tools. This study underscores the importance of robust evaluation when employing serological assays for SARS-CoV-2 detection in cattle populations.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.03.587933v1" target="_blank">Comparative analysis of serological assays and sero-surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 exposure in US cattle</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Visualization Guardrails: Designing Interventions Against Cherry-Picking in Interactive Data Explorers</strong> -
<div>
The growing popularity of interactive time series exploration platforms has made visualizing data of public interest more accessible to general audiences. At the same time, the democratized access to professional-looking explorers with preloaded data enables the creation of convincing visualizations with carefully cherry-picked items. Prior research shows that people use data explorers to create and share charts that support their potentially biased or misleading views on public health or economic policy and that such charts have, for example, contributed to the spread of COVID-19 misinformation. Interventions against misinformation have focused on post hoc approaches such as fact-checking or removing misleading content, which are known to be challenging to execute. In this work, we explore whether we can use visualization design to impede cherry-picking—one of the most common methods employed by deceptive charts created on data exploration platforms. We describe a design space of guardrails—interventions against cherry-picking in time series explorers. Using our design space, we create a prototype data explorer with four types of guardrails and conduct two crowd-sourced experiments. In the first experiment, we challenge participants to create cherry-picked charts. We then use these charts in a second experiment to evaluate the guardrails’ impact on the perception of cherry-picking. We find evidence that guardrails—particularly superimposing relevant primary data—are successful at encouraging skepticism in a subset of experimental conditions but come with limitations. Based on our findings, we propose recommendations for developing effective guardrails for visualizations.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://osf.io/4j9nr/" target="_blank">Visualization Guardrails: Designing Interventions Against Cherry-Picking in Interactive Data Explorers</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Misleading Beyond Visual Tricks: How People Actually Lie with Charts</strong> -
<div>
Data visualizations can empower an audience to make informed decisions. At the same time, deceptive representations of data can lead to inaccurate interpretations while still providing an illusion of data-driven insights. Existing research on misleading visualizations primarily focuses on examples of charts and techniques previously reported to be deceptive. These approaches do not necessarily describe how charts mislead the general population in practice. We instead present an analysis of data visualizations found in a real-world discourse of a significant global event—Twitter posts with visualizations related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our work shows that, contrary to conventional wisdom, violations of visualization design guidelines are not the dominant way people mislead with charts. Specifically, they do not disproportionately lead to reasoning errors in posters’ arguments. Through a series of examples, we present common reasoning errors and discuss how even faithfully plotted data visualizations can be used to support misinformation online.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://osf.io/ky6th/" target="_blank">Misleading Beyond Visual Tricks: How People Actually Lie with Charts</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Multi-ancestry GWAS of diarrhea during acute SARS-CoV2 infection identifies multiple novel loci and contrasting etiological roles of irritable bowel syndrome subtypes</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
A substantial proportion of acute SARSCoV2 infection cases exhibit gastrointestinal symptoms, yet the genetic determinants of these extrapulmonary manifestations are poorly understood. Using survey data from 239,866 individuals who tested positively for SARSCoV2, we conducted a multi-ancestry GWAS of 80,289 cases of diarrhea occurring during acute COVID19 infection (33.5%). Six loci (CYP7A1, LZFTl1/CCR9, TEME182, NALCN, LFNG, GCKR) met genomewide significance in a trans-ancestral analysis. The top significant GWAS hit mapped to the CYP7A1 locus, which plays an etiologic role in bile acid metabolism and is in high LD (r2= 0.93) with the SDCBP gene, which was previously implicated in antigen processing and presentation in the COVID-19 context. Another association was observed with variants in the LZTFL1/CCR9 region, which is a known locus for COVID19 susceptibility and severity. PheWAS showed a shared association across three of the six SNPs with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and its subtypes. Mendelian randomization showed that genetic liability to IBS-diarrhea increased (OR=1.40,95%,CI[1.33,1.47]), and liability to IBS-constipation decreased (OR=0.86, 95%CI[0.79,0.94]) the relative odds of experiencing COVID19+ diarrhea. Our genetic findings provide etiological insights into the extrapulmonary manifestations of acute SARSCoV2 infection.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.03.24305274v1" target="_blank">Multi-ancestry GWAS of diarrhea during acute SARS-CoV2 infection identifies multiple novel loci and contrasting etiological roles of irritable bowel syndrome subtypes</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Ready-To-Use Investigational Stem Cells, MiSaver, in Patients with Recent Acute Myocardial Infarction, 1 year follow up from a Phase 1 Safety Study</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Abstract: Objectives: This study aimed to assess the safety and preliminary efficacy of MiSaver stem cells in enhancing left ventricular ejection function and functional activity among patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI). Background: Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) remain the leading cause of global mortality, with heart attacks and strokes accounting for a significant portion of deaths. Recovery of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) post-myocardial infarction (MI) is crucial for prognosis, as patients with poor LVEF recovery face increased risks of sudden cardiac arrest events and mortality. Stem cell therapy offers regenerative potential for cardiovascular diseases, yet accessibility remains limited. This study investigates the safety and efficacy of MiSaver, a prefabricated stem cell investigational product, in recent AMI patients, aiming to enhance accessibility and patient outcomes. Methods: Patients who were admitted for AMI within 7 days and had reduced LVEF (≤45%) were eligible for the study. MiSaver were matched for blood group and administered in participants in cohorts of five, each receiving escalating dosages (0.5x10^7, 1.6x10^7, and 5.0x10^7 cells/kg, respectively). Patients were assessed for symptoms of graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) and treatment-related adverse events (AE). LVEF measured by echocardiographic on admission, at 6 months, and at 12 months after treatment. Patients functional activity status evalution ( using the New York Heart Association (NYHA) and Canadian Cardiovascular Society (CCS) classification systems. Results: Out of the initially planned 15 participants, eleven were enrolled in the study. The trial was halted prematurely due to challenges associated with the COVID-19 pandemic and impractical transportation logistics. During the 12-month follow-up period, no study-related adverse events or signs of graft-versus-host disease were reported. At 12 months post-treatment, both the low and middle dose groups, as well as participant 11, showed improved left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), accompanied by enhanced Canadian Cardiovascular Society (CCS) class grades compared to baseline. Conclusion: Intravenous infusion of MiSaver stem cells in AMI patients demonstrated safety and tolerability for low and middle dosage groups, suggesting potential for improving left ventricular function following AMI. However, further research with larger cohorts and controlled placebos is necessary to confirm these findings and address trial limitations encountered.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.01.24305125v2" target="_blank">Ready-To-Use Investigational Stem Cells, MiSaver, in Patients with Recent Acute Myocardial Infarction, 1 year follow up from a Phase 1 Safety Study</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Effect of Paxlovid Treatment During Acute COVID-19 on Long COVID Onset: An EHR-Based Target Trial Emulation from the N3C and RECOVER Consortia</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Preventing and treating post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection (PASC), commonly known as Long COVID, has become a public health priority. In this study, we examined whether treatment with Paxlovid in the acute phase of COVID-19 helps prevent the onset of PASC. We used electronic health records from the National Covid Cohort Collaborative (N3C) to define a cohort of 426,352 patients who had COVID-19 since April 1, 2022, and were eligible for Paxlovid treatment due to risk for progression to severe COVID-19. We used the target trial emulation (TTE) framework to estimate the effect of Paxlovid treatment on PASC incidence. We estimated overall PASC incidence using a computable phenotype. We also measured the onset of novel cognitive, fatigue, and respiratory symptoms in the post-acute period. Paxlovid treatment did not have a significant effect on overall PASC incidence (relative risk [RR] = 0.98, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.95-1.01). However, it had a protective effect on cognitive (RR = 0.90, 95% CI 0.84-0.96) and fatigue (RR = 0.95, 95% CI 0.91-0.98) symptom clusters, which suggests that the etiology of these symptoms may be more closely related to viral load than that of respiratory symptoms.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.01.20.24301525v2" target="_blank">Effect of Paxlovid Treatment During Acute COVID-19 on Long COVID Onset: An EHR-Based Target Trial Emulation from the N3C and RECOVER Consortia</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Ready-To-Use Investigational Stem Cells, MiSaver, in Patients with Recent Acute Myocardial Infarction, 1 year follow up from a Phase 1 Safety Study</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Abstract: Objectives: This study aimed to assess the safety and preliminary efficacy of MiSaver stem cells in enhancing left ventricular ejection function and functional activity among patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI). Background: Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) remain the leading cause of global mortality, with heart attacks and strokes accounting for a significant portion of deaths. Recovery of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) post-myocardial infarction (MI) is crucial for prognosis, as patients with poor LVEF recovery face increased risks of sudden cardiac arrest events and mortality. Stem cell therapy offers regenerative potential for cardiovascular diseases, yet accessibility remains limited. This study investigates the safety and efficacy of MiSaver, a prefabricated stem cell investigational product, in recent AMI patients, aiming to enhance accessibility and patient outcomes. Methods: Patients admitted for AMI with reduced LVEF (≤45%) were eligible. MiSaver stem cells, matched for blood group, were administered to participants in cohorts of five, with escalating dosages (0.5x10^7, 1.6x10^7, and 5.0x10^7 cells/kg) 2-5 days post-AMI onset. Echocardiographic assessments were conducted upon admission, at 6 months, and at 12 months post-treatment. Results: Out of the initially planned 15 participants, eleven were enrolled in the study. The trial was halted prematurely due to challenges associated with the COVID-19 pandemic and impractical transportation logistics. During the 12-month follow-up period, no study-related adverse events or signs of graft-versus-host disease were reported. At 12 months post-treatment, both the low and middle dose groups, as well as participant 11, showed improved left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), accompanied by enhanced Canadian Cardiovascular Society (CCS) class grades compared to baseline. Conclusion: Intravenous infusion of MiSaver stem cells in AMI patients demonstrated safety and tolerability for low and middle dosage groups, suggesting potential for improving left ventricular function following AMI. However, further research with larger cohorts and controlled placebos is necessary to confirm these findings and address trial limitations encountered.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.01.24305125v1" target="_blank">Ready-To-Use Investigational Stem Cells, MiSaver, in Patients with Recent Acute Myocardial Infarction, 1 year follow up from a Phase 1 Safety Study</a>
</div></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-clinical-trials">From Clinical Trials</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>Effect of Probiotic Strain Lactobacillus Paracasei PS23 on Brain Fog in People With Long COVID</strong> - <b>Conditions</b>: Long COVID; Brain Fog; Cognitive Change <br/><b>Interventions</b>: Dietary Supplement: Lactobacillus paracasei PS23; Dietary Supplement: microcrystalline cellulose <br/><b>Sponsors</b>: Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan <br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></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>Fascial Tissue Response To Manual Therapy: Implications In Long Covid Rehabilitation</strong> - <b>Conditions</b>: COVID-19 <br/><b>Interventions</b>: Other: Guidebook; Other: Guidebook and Myofascial Reorganization® (RMF). <br/><b>Sponsors</b>: University of the State of Santa Catarina; Larissa Sinhorim <br/><b>Recruiting</b></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>Evaluation of the Impact of Rehabilitation Strategies and Early Discharge After Respiratory Failure</strong> - <b>Conditions</b>: Acute Respiratory Failure <br/><b>Interventions</b>: Behavioral: Standard of Care; Behavioral: Rehabilitation <br/><b>Sponsors</b>: Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein <br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></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>Diaphragmatic Breathing Exercises for Post-COVID-19 Diaphragmatic Dysfunction (DD)</strong> - <b>Conditions</b>: Post-Acute Sequelae of COVID-19 <br/><b>Interventions</b>: Other: Usual care of traditional treatment; Other: Specific DB program/Diaphragmatic manipulation program <br/><b>Sponsors</b>: University of Minnesota <br/><b>Recruiting</b></p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-pubmed">From PubMed</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>DLD is a potential therapeutic target for COVID-19 infection in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma patients</strong> - Since the discovery of copper induces cell death(cuprotosis) in 2022, it has been one of the biggest research hotspots. cuprotosis related genes (CRGs) has been demonstrated to be a potential therapeutic target for cancer, however, the molecular mechanism of CRGs in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infected in DLBCL patients has not been reported yet. Therefore, our research objective is first to elucidate the mechanism and role of CRGs in COVID-19. Secondly, we conducted univariate and…</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>Immunoglobulin G4-related disease and B-cell malignancy due to an IKZF1 gain-of-function variant</strong> - CONCLUSION: Heterozygosity for gain-of-function IKZF1 variants underlies autoimmunity/inflammatory diseases, IgG4-RD and B-cell malignancies, the onset of which may occur in adulthood. Clinical and immunological data are similar to those for patients with unexplained IgG4-RD. Patients may therefore benefit from treatments inhibiting pathways displaying IKAROS-mediated overactivity.</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>Toll like receptor 4 mediates the inhibitory effect of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein on proximal tubule albumin endocytosis</strong> - Tubular proteinuria is a common feature in COVID-19 patients, even in the absence of established acute kidney injury. SARS-CoV-2 spike protein (S protein) was shown to inhibit megalin-mediated albumin endocytosis in proximal tubule epithelial cells (PTECs). Angiotensin-converting enzyme type 2 (ACE2) was not directly involved. Since Toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4) mediates S protein effects in various cell types, we hypothesized that TLR4 could be participating in the inhibition of PTECs albumin…</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>Coordination chemistry suggests that independently observed benefits of metformin and Zn(2+) against COVID-19 are not independent</strong> - Independent trials indicate that either oral Zn^(2+) or metformin can separately improve COVID-19 outcomes by approximately 40%. Coordination chemistry predicts a mechanistic relationship and therapeutic synergy. Zn^(2+) deficit is a known risk factor for both COVID-19 and non-infectious inflammation. Most dietary Zn^(2+) is not absorbed. Metformin is a naked ligand that presumably increases intestinal Zn^(2+) bioavailability and active absorption by cation transporters known to transport…</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>SARS-CoV-2 and the Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme 2 Receptor: Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme Inhibitor/Angiotensin 2 Receptor Blocker Utilization and a Shift Towards the Renin-Angiotensin-Aldosterone System Classical Pathway</strong> - Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus responsible for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, uses the surface angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) receptor as the site of entry into host cardiac, respiratory, intestinal, renal, and nervous system cells. Predisposing risk factors such as cardiovascular disease increase the risk of developing severe disease. Hypertension is characterized by the stimulation of the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system…</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>Ipsilateral and contralateral coadministration of influenza and COVID-19 vaccines produce similar antibody responses</strong> - BACKGROUND: World Health Organisation (WHO) and USA Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S. CDC) recommendations now allow simultaneous administration of COVID-19 and other vaccines. We compared antibody responses after coadministration of influenza and bivalent COVID-19 vaccines in the same (ipsilateral) arm vs. different (contralateral) arms.</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>Inhibition of the RLR signaling pathway by SARS-CoV-2 ORF7b is mediated by MAVS and abrogated by ORF7b-homologous interfering peptide</strong> - Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection and characterized by dysregulated immune response. Studies have shown that the SARS-CoV-2 accessory protein ORF7b induces host cell apoptosis through the tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) pathway and blocks the production of interferon beta (IFN-β). The underlying mechanism remains to be investigated. In this study, we found that ORF7b facilitated viral infection and…</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>TRAIL and IP-10 dynamics in pregnant women post COVID-19 vaccination: associations with neutralizing antibody potency</strong> - INTRODUCTION: The aim of this study is to investigate changes in TNF-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) and gamma interferon-induced protein 10 (IP-10) after COVID-19 vaccination in pregnant women and to explore their association with neutralizing antibody (Nab) inhibition.</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>Assessment of the activity of the immune system in patients with inflammatory bowel diseases and asymptomatic COVID-19</strong> - CONCLUSIONS: The increased concentration of IL-2 may result from its regulatory role in inhibiting excessive activation of the immune system; however, considering the studies of patients with severe COVID-19, its role in the initial phase of SARS-CoV-2 infection requires further research.</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>Quercetin inhibition of porcine intestinal alpha coronavirus in vitro and in vivo</strong> - CONCLUSIONS: Therefore, this study provides compelling evidence that quercetin has great potential and promising applications for anti- SADS-CoV action.</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>Immunogenicity and efficacy of VLA2001 vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 infection in male cynomolgus macaques</strong> - CONCLUSIONS: We demonstrate that the VLA2001 adjuvanted vaccine is immunogenic both in mouse and NHP models and prevent cynomolgus macaques from the viruses responsible of COVID-19.</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>A rigorous theoretical and numerical analysis of a nonlinear reaction-diffusion epidemic model pertaining dynamics of COVID-19</strong> - The spatial movement of the human population from one region to another and the existence of super-spreaders are the main factors that enhanced the disease incidence. Super-spreaders refer to the individuals having transmitting ability to multiple pathogens. In this article, an epidemic model with spatial and temporal effects is formulated to analyze the impact of some preventing measures of COVID-19. The model is developed using six nonlinear partial differential equations. The infectious…</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>A randomized trial to assess the acceleration of viral clearance by the combination Favipiravir/Ivermectin/Niclosamide in mild-to-moderate COVID-19 adult patients (FINCOV)</strong> - CONCLUSION: Viral clearance rates did not differ significantly between the FPV/IVM/NCL combination therapy and FPV-alone groups of individuals with mild-to-moderate COVID-19, although the combined regimen demonstrated a synergistic effect in vitro. No discernible clinical benefit was observed. Further research is required to explore the potential benefits of FVP beyond its antiviral effects.</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>SARS-CoV-2 nsp15 endoribonuclease antagonizes dsRNA-induced antiviral signaling</strong> - Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV)-2 has caused millions of deaths since its emergence in 2019. Innate immune antagonism by lethal CoVs such as SARS-CoV-2 is crucial for optimal replication and pathogenesis. The conserved nonstructural protein 15 (nsp15) endoribonuclease (EndoU) limits activation of double-stranded (ds)RNA-induced pathways, including interferon (IFN) signaling, protein kinase R (PKR), and oligoadenylate synthetase/ribonuclease L (OAS/RNase L) during diverse…</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>Why have SGLT2 Inhibitors Failed to Achieve the Desired Success in COVID-19?</strong> - The SARS-CoV-2 virus emerged towards the end of 2019 and caused a major worldwide pandemic lasting at least 2 years, causing a disease called COVID-19. SARS-CoV-2 caused a severe infection with direct cellular toxicity, stimulation of cytokine release, increased oxidative stress, disruption of endothelial structure, and thromboinflammation, as well as angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) down-regulation-mediated renin-angiotensin system (RAS) activation. In addition to glucosuria and…</p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-patent-search">From Patent Search</h1>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="daily-dose">Daily-Dose</h1>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
<ul>
<li><a href="#from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-vox">From Vox</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</a></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</h1>
<ul>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Nayib Bukele’s Authoritarian Appeal</strong> - El Salvador’s President has targeted critics, sent troops into the legislature, and violated the country’s constitution to maintain his hold on power. Why is he still so popular at home and abroad? - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/nayib-bukeles-authoritarian-appeal">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How Chinese Students Experience America</strong> - COVID, guns, anti-Asian violence, and diplomatic relations have complicated the ambitions of the some three hundred thousand college students who come to the U.S. each year. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/04/08/how-chinese-students-experience-america">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Hottest Restaurant in France Is an All-You-Can-Eat Buffet</strong> - Les Grands Buffets features a seven-tiered lobster tower, a chocolate fountain, and only what it considers traditional French food. Gourmands are willing to wait months for a table. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/04/08/les-grands-buffets-and-the-art-of-all-you-can-eat">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>So You Think You’ve Been Gaslit</strong> - What happens when a niche clinical concept becomes a ubiquitous cultural diagnosis. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/04/08/so-you-think-youve-been-gaslit">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Brazilian Special-Forces Unit Fighting to Save the Amazon</strong> - As miners ravage Yanomami lands, combat-trained environmentalists work to root them out. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/04/08/the-brazilian-special-forces-unit-fighting-to-save-the-amazon">link</a></p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-vox">From Vox</h1>
<ul>
<li><strong>Americans are hooked on the fantasy of financial liberation</strong> -
<figure>
<img alt="Chalk-drawn stick figures stacked in a pyramid on a black background." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/nv6M7jxVj6aqYcMF5lME1jV0cV8=/107x0:1814x1280/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73261581/GettyImages_184321603.0.jpg"/>
<figcaption>
Getty Images
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
What multilevel marketing schemes are really selling.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gmB5TY">
Have you ever been invited by a friend or a family member to a coffee shop or a lunch date, and when you get there you realize that they don’t just want to catch up?
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jibj0V">
Instead, it turns out they’ve got a great business opportunity for you. All you have to do is spend a little money on the front end, maybe buy a package of protein supplements or meal replacement smoothies, and pretty soon you’ll be your own boss and living the dream.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="N7HMZ3">
If that sounds familiar, it’s because this is an enormously popular business model, called multilevel marketing (MLM), in which sellers make money either by selling products or recruiting others to sell those products. Millions of people in America participate in MLMs, and while the people at the top make billions and wield a lot of power, roughly 99 percent<strong> </strong>of the people who join up don’t make — and often lose — money. For that reason, MLMs have — rightly — been controversial and a target of regulators. Critics see them as little more than legal pyramid schemes.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zBGIn0">
One of those critics is Jane Marie, the host of a podcast series called <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-dream/id1435743296"><em>The Dream</em></a><em> </em>and the author of a new book, <a href="https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Selling-the-Dream/Jane-Marie/9781982155773"><em>Selling the Dream</em></a>, both of which investigate the intersection of MLMs and pyramid schemes and the broader “wellness” industry. I wanted to know a little more about the history of these businesses and why they persist despite their track record, so I invited Marie on <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-gray-area"><em>The Gray Area</em></a> to talk about it.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jHaTlz">
Below is an excerpt of our conversation, edited for length and clarity. As always, there’s much more in the full podcast, so listen to and follow <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-gray-area"><em>The Gray Area</em></a> on <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-gray-area-with-sean-illing/id1081584611">Apple Podcasts</a>, <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6NOJ6IkTb2GWMj1RpmtnxP">Spotify</a>, <a href="https://www.stitcher.com/show/vox-conversations">Stitcher</a>, or wherever you find podcasts. New episodes drop every Monday.
</p>
<div id="eeJhgc">
</div>
<hr class="p-entry-hr" id="6BN4Us"/>
<h4 id="OflXU1">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wUc4cU">
What’s the simplest definition of multilevel marketing?
</p>
<h4 id="euEmTN">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="v1EauI">
Basically, if you picture a triangle, there’s people that own it at the very top. Then they recruit, say, five people, and the way the scheme goes is those five people are supposed to recruit five more, and then those five are supposed to recruit five more, and the idea is that it keeps expanding exponentially.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qV5YKe">
And the way multilevel marketing companies differentiate themselves from straight-up pyramid schemes is that there’s some sort of product or service involved. It gets sold to people being recruited into it. Almost all of them have a sign-up fee. They usually have a kit or a collection of products that you have to purchase right away when you join. And that money is what flows up the pyramid. The people at the very bottom often quit pretty quickly because they’re not making any money, and then they’re replaced by more eager, hopeful folks who buy what the company is selling, which is false hope.
</p>
<h4 id="cuOyZy">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zNA9Af">
Is there actually a meaningful distinction between a pyramid scheme and an MLM?
</p>
<h4 id="k8HDYd">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="E2iWHN">
I don’t think so, but the legal difference, which is debatable, is that there’s a valid product or service involved in an MLM. But when you dig a little deeper, the products are typically overpriced. They’re not something unique. They’re things you can find in the regular marketplace for a lot cheaper, or the service is offering something that’s cheaper and works better.
</p>
<h4 id="xQRmQd">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UClihZ">
Do we have any idea how many active MLMs there are now and how many billions the industry brings in every year?
</p>
<h4 id="EWormq">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QzfKRz">
One in 13 adults in America have participated in an MLM, which is a lot. And they’ve expanded into developing countries. So there’s a huge MLM presence now in Southeast Asia and in Mexico and South America. It’s just a guess, but I’d say the industry is probably worth $40 billion or $50 billion.
</p>
<h4 id="c5lxR0">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="XcSisr">
MLMs disproportionately target women and they seem to thrive in rural areas and on military bases where spouses are often alone with the kids. In many ways, that’s not all that surprising, but how do you explain it?
</p>
<h4 id="s6h1X8">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UjK2Hg">
Well, they’re feeding on the idea that we’re all raised on in America, which is that if you work hard, try hard, you’ll get rewarded. The world is your oyster — that whole thing. But it just isn’t true. The promise is still very attractive, though. The appeal of the American dream, it doesn’t ever really go away. And the architects of these schemes understand that that’s all you really need to appeal to.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GFSq1S">
This is what they sell. <em>Do you remember how when you were growing up, you were told that you should be able to achieve anything you want? We’re going to be the only company that gives you that opportunity. </em>And even better, they don’t ask if you have a high school diploma. They don’t care if you’re a felon. You can do anything and be anything. And they’re specifically going after groups that need that opportunity or that feel they need that opportunity and aren’t given that opportunity by the mainstream marketplace.
</p>
<h4 id="Pm5gkT">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LJbL5A">
The thing that really drove me to your book is how you draw a straight line between what we think of as the “wellness industry,” which includes the vapid world of online “life coaches,” and MLMs. Can you tell me about the connections here? Why is the story of MLMs also the story about the rise of wellness hucksters and life coaches?
</p>
<h4 id="y6iQJO">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="37kNXR">
It’s kind of an endless chicken and egg thing, but I’ll tell you the elements that I see.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EUP4zp">
One thing is that MLMs, wellness, and life coaching all preach this idea that they — the big “they” — don’t want you to know that there is in fact a cheat code to life. They don’t want you to know that you don’t have to go to therapy. You just need a life coach. They don’t want you to know that you don’t have to do chemotherapy, you just need to buy this vitamin or this oil. They don’t want you to know that you don’t have to go to college, you can just sell Tupperware.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QbrAsr">
So it’s the same mindset with all this. There’s an “us versus them” mentality and it feeds on the idea that there’s a shortcut and a cheat code to financial prosperity, to achieving the American Dream.
</p>
<h4 id="LoX0oa">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nsUYC2">
I’ve spent an embarrassing amount of time on Instagram surveying the whole life coaching space and the amount of bullshit on offer is just incredible. I realize not all life coaching is like this, but there’s a guy I used to know a long time ago and I discovered recently that this is what he does. And he’s not just a “life coach,” he’s the coach of aspiring life coaches. He was always charismatic and now he’s shifted into some kind of New Age douchebag Socrates, and it appears to be working very well for him.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7wMUiI">
But it looks like a straight-up pyramid scheme to me, a lot like the classic MLMs, because it relies on this fantasy that there’s an infinite supply of clients out there for these potential life coaches. And maybe there is, in theory at least, but the reality is that almost every one of these people are going to spend thousands of dollars taking this stupid guy’s stupid course and they’re not going to make any of it back!
</p>
<h4 id="D0c6Tz">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pFolu1">
Unless they develop their own course, which is also what he’s teaching them. He’s showing them the way to make money selling the course!
</p>
<h4 id="EseHU7">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OTDmSX">
Right, that’s the pyramid! But the music is going to stop and the people at the bottom of the pyramid won’t have chairs to sit in.
</p>
<h4 id="33Sd6o">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AXham5">
That’s absolutely right. But the people who traffic in these schemes think that’s fairness. They believe that not everyone’s going to have a chair to sit in and that makes sense to them. Not everyone gets to be a billionaire. Only the smartest, most hardworking people are billionaires, which we all know isn’t true. But that is a mindset.
</p>
<h4 id="zoH3ks">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="l62YcK">
The other side of the wellness industry is also bullshit but it’s a little different. It’s the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/02/08/gwyneth-paltrows-goop-lab-is-horrible-medical-industry-is-partly-blame/">world of essential oils</a> and supplements and tinctures and alternative therapies and that kind of stuff. Is someone like <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/05/business/goop-vaginal-egg-settlement.html">Gwyneth Paltrow</a> patient zero for this particular disease, at least the modern version of it?
</p>
<h4 id="YylKZV">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1fFoGm">
In the modern era, yeah. I would say she is the poster woman for the wellness industry, and even she’s gotten in trouble for peddling garbage. She had <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/9/6/17826924/goop-yoni-egg-gwyneth-paltrow-settlement">that whole jade egg thing</a> that you were supposed to put in your vagina.
</p>
<h4 id="pWI7M6">
Sean Illing
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="MaE5jO">
Why doesn’t the FDA regulate any of this stuff in the wellness supplement space? Could they do it even if they wanted to?
</p>
<h4 id="KXLN9X">
Jane Marie
</h4>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="c8Q0HA">
They put boundaries around it a few times. We’ve created laws over the last hundred years or so around what constitutes food and drug. This distinction is important. What’s a food and what’s a drug? Well, a drug is something that is proven to treat, cure, or alleviate an ailment, and that has to be proven a certain way according to their guidelines.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="XkkFy7">
And then foods are things that keep you alive. So that leaves a lot of stuff out there that people can just make up and say, <em>This’ll help with this or that. It’s not a drug and it’s not a food, but you probably want to drink it. Because it’s going to make you feel better, or in some way help</em>.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AnQ9YY">
They do get in trouble every once in a while when people get sick. There’s been plenty of them that have been found to have high levels of lead or other poisonous metals, and then they get closed down after that. But the FDA doesn’t really have the bandwidth to check out every single bottle of vitamins.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hV9Kyc">
The trickiest thing about the vitamin stuff is you don’t know actually what’s in them. So if I’m going to buy vitamin C, vitamin C does nothing. I mean, you need it, but you don’t need thousands of milligrams a day and it’s not going to get rid of your cold. And so if that was what’s in the bottle, it’s fine to take it. It’s not going to kill you.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xAHRxP">
But there is no agency that tests every different factory’s vitamin C or says, this is how much vitamin C is actually in that pill. And there have been plenty of cases of someone finally testing some bottle of vitamins from the grocery store and finding out, actually, there’s no vitamin C in here. It’s sugar or whatever. It’s like something else entirely.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6vgVSA">
<em>To hear the rest of the conversation, </em><a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-american-dream-is-a-pyramid-scheme/id1081584611?i=1000651052073"><em>click here</em></a><em>, and be sure to follow </em><a href="https://www.vox.com/thegrayarea">The Gray Area</a><em> on </em><a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-gray-area-with-sean-illing/id1081584611"><em>Apple Podcasts</em></a><em>, </em><a href="https://podcasts.google.com/search/vox%20conversations"><em>Google Podcasts</em></a><em>, </em><a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6NOJ6IkTb2GWMj1RpmtnxP"><em>Spotify</em></a><em>, </em><a href="https://www.pandora.com/podcast/the-gray-area-with-sean-illing/PC:30793"><em>Pandora</em></a><em>, or wherever you listen to podcasts.</em>
</p></li>
<li><strong>The Western visuals of Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter, decoded</strong> -
<figure>
<img alt="Beyoncé sitting sidesaddle on a galloping white horse, wearing a red, white, and blue Western outfit with a sash reading Cowboy Carter and holding an American flag." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/9H3iTxKhJ8sEouxnSuMwtv8jpNo=/0x0:1158x869/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73261528/Screenshot_2024_03_28_at_11.21.53_AM.0.png"/>
<figcaption>
Beyoncé/Blair Cardwell via Instagram
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Country music uses the West as a synecdoche for America. Beyoncé is here to disrupt that.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zC9RZM">
Of all the pop stars currently working in America, Beyoncé is undoubtedly the most visually sophisticated. Every new album comes with a lush, rigorously staged set of images, dense with allusions and Easter eggs, that act as an elaboration and a commentary on the themes of the album.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="u8LUWA">
In the <em>Lemonade</em> era around 2016, Beyoncé made herself into a goddess of many identities: <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/2/3/14484610/beyonce-social-media-pregnancy-art-venus-virgin-mary-mami-wata-awol-erizku">the Christian Virgin Mary, the Roman Venus</a>, the <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2020/7/31/21349403/beyonce-black-is-king-oshun-osun-yoruba-goddess">Yoruba Oshun</a>. With 2022’s <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2023/12/5/23988555/renaissance-movie-review-beyonce"><em>Renaissance</em></a>, she became a disco diva celebrating the pleasures of the dance floor as a safe space for queer Black joy.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gvwFli">
Now, in <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/24114603/beyonces-cowboy-carter-cmas-2016-country-music-history"><em>Cowboy Carter</em></a>, the country-inflected album she dropped at the end of March, Beyoncé has reinvented herself in perhaps the most difficult transformation of all. She’s transformed herself from American goddess into goddess of America.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="KNq8Tw">
Let’s decode the imagery of <em>Cowboy Carter</em> together.
</p>
<h3 id="HhxB7J">
Sweetheart of the rodeo
</h3>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gZ5cEt">
The album cover for <em>Cowboy Carter</em> sees Beyoncé sitting sidesaddle on a white horse, in red, white, and blue leathers. In one hand she’s holding the horse’s reins, and in the other, the American flag. Together, her upraised arms and her head and neck create a sort of W shape.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wd5dYR">
“It’s such an awkward and specific gesture,” says Sonya Abrego, a design historian specializing in the history of American fashion. “I really don’t think Beyoncé and her team did that accidentally.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iCcPcL">
Abrego sees Beyoncé’s pose as echoing the posture of a woman in an illustrated map called “<a href="https://www.quarterhorsenews.com/2016/09/the-evolution-of-the-cowboy-1933-jo-mora/">Evolution of the Cowboy</a>,” created by artist Jo Mora in 1933. The full illustration charts the way cowboy gear and techniques changed over time, along with a rundown of the different cowboy archetypes of various territories. In the center top of the chart, though, we see a woman in a cowboy hat and riding leathers, standing with her arms upraised so that, together with her head and neck, they create a W shape. Behind her, a legend reads “sweetheart of the rodeo.” Flowers blossom in the air where she gestures; she is the bountiful source of the rodeo and all that it signifies.
</p>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/VMT3A3sPhn12TzE_qjKp4AXEfvo=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25375552/TheByrdsSweetheartoftheRodeo.jpg"/> <cite>Columbia via Wikimedia Commons</cite>
<figcaption>
Mara’s sweetheart of the rodeo became the cover of a Byrds album.
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vRXumZ">
The sweetheart of the rodeo has appeared on album covers. The Byrds used her on the cover of their 1968 album, tellingly titled <em>Sweetheart of the Rodeo</em>. It was known as one of the first country-rock albums, a crossover country album from a band that, like Beyoncé, built their name on a different genre.
</p>
<h3 id="yoQMyQ">
The horse of a different color
</h3>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UfjsfB">
The horse Beyoncé is riding on the cover of <em>Cowboy Carter</em> looks white, but it’s not just any white horse. <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-68686378">It’s a Lipizzaner</a>, a breed that is usually born with a brown or black coat that grows in gray and then white over time. This transition is <a href="https://generatio.de/en/guidance/lexicon/grey-progressive-whitening-horse">common among gray horses</a>, but it’s a telling choice here — especially given the themes of the album, with its name-check to Linda Martell, the first <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/linda-martell-beyonce-country-cowboy-carter-1234995662/">solo Black woman country artist to play the Grand Ole Opry</a>.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3AdZJj">
The title <em>Cowboy Carter</em>, too, nods to the whitewashed work of Black artists in the history of country music. The Carter Family was one of country’s weightiest acts, and they developed their distinctive sound <a href="https://www.hnoc.org/publications/first-draft/not-their-first-rodeo-black-musicians-and-birth-country-music">under the influence of Black musician Lesley Riddle</a>. Riddle taught them his innovative style of guitar picking, and he got the Carters entrance to Black spaces, like churches, to help them gather songs from Black communities that went on to help form the basis of the white country songbook.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3ccNVJ">
<em>Cowboy Carter</em> is a history lesson on the Black musicians who helped build country music and whose contributions were swiftly whitewashed. It’s fitting, then, that Beyoncé ride a horse that was black at its birth but is now considered white.
</p>
<h3 id="x4HhDf">
The All-American girl
</h3>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="Beyoncé, wearing braids and naked except for a sash reading “act ii BEYINCÉ,” holds a smoking cigar." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/aQ-1LNGfkwcUKy9VV8lbmG5_ri4=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25359528/Screenshot_2024_03_28_at_11.22.26_AM.png"/> <cite>Beyoncé/Blair Cardwell via Instagram</cite>
<figcaption>
On the album’s vinyl cover, Beyoncé channels Lady Liberty.
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sNH401">
On the official album cover, Beyoncé’s wearing the colors of the American flag on her body and holding the American flag. On the vinyl cover, she’s standing in a Statue of Liberty pose with a Miss America sash around her torso and her hair in red, white, and blue beads. She’s playing with one of the common visual motifs of country music, which is Americana kitsch.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Td7JTp">
In country and Western music, the West acts as a synecdoche for America itself: Western iconography is American iconography because the West <em>is</em> America.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5T6CEu">
“If you go around the world and ask people for a symbol of the United States, it’s the cowboy that people say,” says Josh Garrett-Davis, H. Russell Smith Foundation curator of Western American history at the Huntington.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="88Nhat">
The cowboy becoming a symbol of America is not an accident, Garrett-Davis points out. In 1893, historian Frederick Jackson Turner posited the <a href="https://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/gilded/empire/text1/turner.pdf">frontier thesis</a>, claiming that the distinctive American character was rough and independent and that it came from the nation’s constant movement westward. Theodore Roosevelt, a wealthy East Coaster who needed to add some grit to his image, picked up on the ideas and began to make much of his time in North Dakota.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EvoOkY">
“All these indicated that just a touch of sort of wildness on the Western frontier could kind of give America its character and refresh,” says Garrett-Davis. “It’s in a sense masculinizing because they were worried that, in the Industrial Age, the country was becoming too feminized.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="C3Hph5">
The heroic myth of the cowboy was also a deeply white supremacist idea. “They erase the fact that a good portion of the working cowboys in the American West were Indigenous, Mexican, and African American,” says Garrett-Davis. “This was a fiction that was created using these icons of the cowboy, but not really the truth of what cowboy life was like. Cowboys were migrant agricultural laborers in terrible conditions being underpaid.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JtE4KJ">
By placing her Black female body in the poses and costumes of Western Americana, Beyoncé disrupts that mythology. She evokes the lineage of the erased people of color who came before her — in the West, in country as a genre — and she insists on her right to be there now.
</p>
<h3 id="B1SoCa">
Whatever else happens, Beyoncé is always a goddess
</h3>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iKz8yR">
Let’s go back to the vinyl cover, with Beyoncé standing in the pose of the Statue of Liberty, replacing the statue’s torch with a boss-man cigar and the statue’s crown with beaded braids. It’s worth remembering that the statue is also a goddess — she’s the <a href="https://www.statueoflibertytour.com/blog/the-woman-behind-the-statue-of-liberty-who-is-lady-liberty/">Roman goddess Libertas</a>, or Liberty. Beyoncé is pulling from the <em>Lemonade</em> playbook here to evoke a classical goddess while keeping the details specifically Beyoncé. She’s also added a touch of masculine swagger with that cigar, reminding us all that before she was a goddess, <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/azafar/why-are-people-calling-beyonce-king-b">Beyoncé crowned herself King B</a>.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="x484ME">
On the pageant queen sash around her torso, Beyoncé’s name appears to be misspelled: Beyincé. The apparent error references a painful family episode. Beyoncé’s name comes from her mother, Tina Knowles, born Celestine Beyoncé. On her birth certificate, though, Tina’s last name was misspelled as “Beyincé.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IjW5cW">
<a href="https://www.today.com/popculture/music/beyonce-name-meaning-beyince-rcna145282">On a recent podcast</a>, Tina says she asked her mother why she didn’t get the birth certificate corrected. “And she said, ‘I did one time. The first time, and I was told, ‘Be happy that you’re getting a birth certificate,’ because, at one time, Black people didn’t get birth certificates,” she added.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dS7flZ">
In the same image where she re-establishes herself as a goddess, Beyoncé references a moment where the very infrastructure of America seemed designed to inflict humiliation on her family because of their Blackness. The play between those two ideas is part of the play of this whole album: placing Black people back in the center of a genre and aesthetic that erased them, and making the moment beautiful.
</p></li>
<li><strong>The Talented Mr. Ripley is a perfect striver gothic. The Netflix adaptation is lifeless.</strong> -
<figure>
<img alt="A black-and-white still of a man sitting at a bar counter, looking somber." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/YnRhUKHLjz8BfIH9xOqGDBRnYg0=/450x0:3150x2025/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73260031/Ripley_u_S1_E1_00_04_40_02_R.0.jpg"/>
<figcaption>
Andrew Scott as Tom Ripley in Netflix’s <em>Ripley.</em> | Courtesy of Netflix
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Ripley fails to capture what makes Highsmith’s book so compelling.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6Zo9jL">
First, the bad news: <a href="https://www.vox.com/netflix">Netflix</a>’s new show <em>Ripley</em>, based on Patricia Highsmith’s immortal novel <em>The Talented Mr. Ripley</em>, is a snooze.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="maxAvb">
It’s shot beautifully. Under the auspices of showrunner Steven Zaillian (the screenwriter for the movie <em>Schindler’s List</em>, among others) and Oscar-winning cinematographer Robert Elswit, <em>Ripley</em> renders its exquisite Italian landscapes and architecture in gorgeous, sinister black and white. The camera is forever panning across a Caravaggio or a palazzo, leaving your eyes time to linger. Each frame is elegantly composed.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Vw6saj">
Yet everything happening within those frames is so boring that it feels like a waste of beauty — not to mention a waste of a more than capable cast. Andrew Scott, who has been so charismatic and emotive in <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/5/22/18634838/fleabag-season-2-review-amazon-phoebe-waller-bridge"><em>Fleabag</em></a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/1/18/14295716/sherlock-season-four-review-plot-holes"><em>Sherlock</em></a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/23875200/poor-things-boy-and-the-heron-anatomy-of-a-fall-tiff-nyff-venice-telluride"><em>All of Us Strangers</em></a>, plays Ripley with a careful detachment, as if he’s been warned not to try to make the audience feel anything. Likable Johnny Flynn (<a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2020/2/28/21153314/emma-movie-sex-autumn-de-wilde-jane-austen-anya-taylor-joy-johnny-flynn"><em>Emma</em></a>., <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/1/8/16853922/lovesick-netflix-review"><em>Lovesick</em></a>), in the less showy role of Ripley’s callow mark Dickie, has himself so reined in that it becomes difficult to understand why Ripley is so drawn to him in the first place. The spark between them that is meant to set the whole plot ablaze ends up feeble and barely visible. (It doesn’t help matters that both Scott and Flynn are over 40, making it difficult to buy them as the sort of just-out-of-college gallivanters whose worried parents might plausibly be keeping a too-close watch on them.)
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9JGAz3">
The biggest waste, though, is the waste of the story itself. Highsmith’s <em>The Talented Mr. Ripley</em> is a particularly stylish entry in a highly specific grouping of stories that are currently having a bit of a moment. Besides Netflix’s <em>Ripley</em>, last fall’s <em>Saltburn</em> launched <a href="https://www.vulture.com/article/is-saltburn-stupid-in-a-good-way-or-a-bad-way.html">a thousand internet arguments</a>. Donna Tartt’s <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2020/5/8/21250613/vox-book-club-the-secret-history-donna-tartt-week-1"><em>The Secret History</em></a> remains the darling of the dark academia readers of <a href="https://www.vox.com/tiktok">TikTok</a>. This is the genre I’ve started to call “striver gothic,” the stories of pretenders striving to make it among the careless and idle wealthy, even if they have to kill to do so. They are stories about how even for the smoothest operator, the sheer force of <em>wanting</em> can eat you alive.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pZWJ3v">
Highsmith’s <em>The Talented Mr. Ripley</em> is a perfect iteration of the striver gothic. Netflix’s <em>Ripley</em> does not stick the landing. Looking at the ways it falls apart can tell us a lot about why these stories appeal to us.
</p>
<h3 id="2nRJfV">
Toward a working definition of “striver gothic”
</h3>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rxtfq4">
Striver gothic is a term I developed with my friend Kirsten Carleton to describe stories that pull from a specific set of tropes. Here are the basics:
</p>
<ul>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vBNmYS">
An outsider main character is desperate for inclusion in a rarified upper-class world. He (and this character usually is a he) is the striver, and it is his desire to ascend from the bourgeoisie to the upper class that powers the story. The upper class is represented in metonymy by a friend group or family with intense, almost cultish insider dynamics. Frequently their group dynamic was formed within the cloistered walls of a school, creating some overlap between this genre and dark academia. They are either Ivy League or Oxbridge — or they borrow the aesthetic.
</li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="K0a0wi">
A country house or manor represents sanctuary, prize, and inclusion within the group.
</li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="uqrIS7">
The main character is obsessed with the leader of the group, frequently with queer undertones: Do I want to be him, or do I want to be with him?
</li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OGSuMV">
Identities are doubled and doppelgängers abound.
</li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="o7Ac3U">
There will be at least one murder, committed either by the striver or by the group he is trying to infiltrate. The boundaries of this world are guarded fiercely, and any attempt to break them ends in death.
</li>
</ul>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YgVBOz">
The nonnegotiables of the striver gothic are a striver and a murder. Everything else you can fiddle with.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="CjTu1C">
For its part, in Netflix’s <em>Ripley</em>, Dickie, his girlfriend Marge, and his friend Freddie are the upper-class friend group that striver Tom longs to penetrate. In his attempt to get there, Tom murders Dickie and takes over his identity, then murders Freddie, too, to cover the whole thing up. <em>Ripley</em> doesn’t quite have a country house (Tom does briefly move into Dickie’s Italian country home, although he prefers city palazzos), but the rest of the tropes are all there. Tom doesn’t have to long for Dickie’s house when he can simply take over Dickie’s whole identity instead.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rU0A6p">
<a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/2/24/18236254/magicians-season-4-episode-5-recap-escape-from-happy-place-quentin-eliot-brideshead-revisited"><em>Brideshead Revisited</em></a> set the template for this genre. It is not a striver gothic in and of itself; it’s not gothic and it contains no murders. It is nonetheless a striver story, with middle-class Charles seduced into a corrupt and decadent wealthy world via his love for aloof, androgynous Sebastian and the enchanted realm they build together at Oxford in the 1920s. In some ways, all the striver gothic stories are attempts to play out the subtext of <em>Brideshead</em>, to bring its suppressed gay longings and its numbed wartime rages out into the light of day.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Vxrywv">
That is in part what happens in <em>The Secret History</em>, perhaps the most complete entry in the genre. There, Richard the pretender makes his way into the rarified world of his college’s classics students by helping them commit and cover up a murder so that they’ll let him stay at their picturesque country lake house. In <em>The Secret History</em>, Richard’s desire for inclusion in the group crosses the line into sexual desire more than once, and the group’s aversion to anyone who betrays the aesthetics of their class is what turns them murderous.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="h2USCa">
Meanwhile, <em>Saltburn</em> wears its derivative nature on its sleeve and straightforwardly places the action of <em>Ripley</em> into the setting of <em>Brideshead</em>. It’s a movie that cannot quite decide if it’s going to be a pastiche, a subversion, or a straight iteration of the striver gothic, which is part of why it’s such a mess.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="76OYic">
I haven’t made a conclusive list here. Tana French’s <em>The Likeness</em> and arguably Daphne du Maurier’s <em>Rebecca</em> are both striver gothics with female strivers. The movie <em>Bodies, Bodies, Bodies</em> parodies the genre, and the most recent season of <em>You</em> sends the murderous Joe Goldberg into a <em>Secret History</em>-style world. Popular culture abounds with strivers.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5pWpEj">
But Tom Ripley is unique. Where <em>Brideshead</em>’s Charles is too earnest, <em>Secret History</em>’s Richard too opaque, and <em>Saltburn</em>’s Oliver simply too psychologically improbable, Tom Ripley is endlessly, delightfully fascinating. That’s probably why people have told his story so many times.
</p>
<h3 id="GeDfSd">
Tom Ripley is the ultimate striver
</h3>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NL424d">
Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley is a man who is always hunting or being hunted.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dU9GQb">
Highsmith drops us straight into Tom’s paranoid, obsessive head from her first page. Her novel opens with Tom fleeing from one bar to another, certain that he’s being followed by the police and that they’re going to arrest him for one of his many petty crimes of forgery and fraud.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1VnCLD">
Tom’s right that he’s being followed, but his pursuer isn’t a police officer. He’s the father of Dickie Greenleaf, an old acquaintance of Tom’s, who thought he recognized Tom and wanted to come say hello. As soon as Tom understands this, he pivots effortlessly. He stops worrying about what his pursuer might have on him, and he starts thinking about what he might be able to get out of his pursuer.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="S6scJX">
In this case, it turns out that Tom can get quite a lot out of Dickie’s father. Dickie, it develops, has been in Italy for years, refusing to come home to New York, no matter how much his parents beg him. With the gentlest of pushes from Tom, Dickie’s businessman father hits on the plan of having Tom go to Italy to persuade Dickie back home — all Tom’s expenses to be paid for on the Greenleaf dime.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vqjHe7">
That’s how Tom Ripley works. He sees the world in a binary of hunter and hunted, target and prey, and always, he is determined to come out ahead. His philosophy is not to worry about the future because something always comes up, and as such, he burns his bridges merrily and without hesitation. It’s nothing new to Tom to have angry people after him, and someone new will always happen along whom he can use to get himself out of one bad situation and into a new one.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="H0G1fG">
There are a lot of sociopaths in literature, but Tom is a peculiar one, an intelligent man who acts almost purely on instinct. He is suave enough to grant the reader pleasure at his exquisite taste, but always wrong on one or two telling details that the truly wealthy observer will inevitably pick up on, marking him as a class pretender. He’s self-aware enough to be funny, but he’s emotionally obtuse enough to miss the subtext in half his conversations and to lie to himself about the other half.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DWkqEh">
Tom’s contradictions, his combination of playfulness, methodical care, and murderous caprice, are part of what make <em>The Talented Mr. Ripley</em> stand out among its peers in the striver gothic. Tom is a striver among strivers, at once fiercely focused on his goals and incapable of considering them too closely. When Tom decides that what he wants, more than anything in the world, is to make Dickie like him, he doesn’t bother to consider closely what it is about Dickie that attracts him, whether he longs for Dickie’s wealth and easy lifestyle or whether he longs for Dickie’s love and admiration for their own sake. He simply identifies his target and acts to reach it.
</p>
<h3 id="SigaOM">
Why <em>Ripley</em> fails
</h3>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rd4r32">
Netflix’s <em>Ripley</em> is the third major adaptation of Highsmith’s novel and, in some ways, the most faithful. It is also the weakest artistically.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bUunvS">
In 1960, the French director René Clément transformed <em>Ripley</em> into <em>Plein Soleil</em>, marketed in the US as <em>Purple Noon</em>. There, Tom becomes a suave and beautiful con artist, more Thomas Crown than Tom Ripley, and he murders his friend less out of frustrated desire than out of rage at his sadism. In Clément’s hands, the story is no longer striver gothic, but it is a sun-soaked and brutal piece of filmmaking.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LNn374">
Probably the most successful adaptation is also the most famous: Anthony Minghella’s 1999 <em>The Talented Mr. Ripley</em>, with Matt Damon as Tom and Jude Law as Dickie. Minghella’s film doesn’t match entirely with Highsmith’s version of the characters. After Highsmith’s Tom murders Dickie, he falls asleep that night “happy, content, and utterly, utterly confident,” but Damon renders Tom a vulnerable sweetheart of a character who weeps as he kills. Moreover, while Highsmith’s Tom is utterly isolated, Minghella invents two new characters he can talk to, through which the audience can learn exactly what the enigmatic Mr. Ripley is thinking. Through those conversations, and through Minghella’s ecstatic camera as it pans over his beautiful actors on luminous Italian beaches, we can see exactly how Tom’s obsession with Dickie takes seed and blossoms, until he feels he has no choice but to murder in the face of Dickie’s rejection.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YHM8Lj">
<em>Ripley</em> is a straight adaptation. It contains barely a scene that does not appear in Highsmith’s book; hardly a scene that does appear in Highsmith’s book gets omitted. What gets left out is Tom’s sense of playfulness, the fun he finds in lying and deceiving. Where Highsmith’s Tom is prone to giggle fits when he thinks of his crimes, Zaillian’s stays sad-eyed and grim. Under Zaillian’s restrained touch, the emotional connections that drive Tom to kill are barely sketched in. Instead, we spend inordinate amounts of time watching him cover up his crimes: lugging bodies painfully and silently around and then scrubbing up the blood.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AV8HTY">
Highsmith, too, pays attention to the details of Tom’s coverups. But she writes about those details with panache. She delights in the elegance and thoroughness of Tom’s work. She makes it glamorous. Zaillian makes it hard and dull and unpleasant. This is doubtless an emotionally accurate depiction of what it’s like to dispose of dead bodies, but who comes to <em>Ripley</em> for that?
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="KrdzdV">
We come to <em>Ripley</em> for Tom Ripley himself. Tom’s flair, his playfulness, his social adroitness mixed with profound blindness regarding his own desires for human intimacy — these are the elements that make this subgenre compelling.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3bcQmb">
One of the pleasures of the striver gothic is the deep ambiguity about why, exactly, the striver is working so hard to get in with the group he’s targeted. Is he doing it because he genuinely likes them? Or because he likes their lifestyle? By extension: Is the genre about how much we long for intimacy from the people we admire? Or is it about how much we long for their money and their beautiful things?
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kX3P3T">
Well, after all, asks Tom Ripley: Why can’t it be both?
</p></li>
</ul>
<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>IPL-17, MI vs DC | Mumbai Indians post 234/5 against Delhi Capitals</strong> - Mumbai Indians post a formidable 234/5 against Delhi Capitals in IPL match with explosive batting display</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>Candidates Chess | Praggnanandhaa stops Gujrathi’s applecart</strong> - Indian grandmaster Praggnanandhaa impresses with a win, while Vaishali secures her first victory in Candidates Chess</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>Jos Buttler overtakes Rohit Sharma as eighth-highest T20 run-getter</strong> - Before this century, Buttler had scored just 183 runs in his previous ten IPL innings</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>Morning Digest | CAA Rules open the door to dual citizenship, anti-CAA petitioners tell SC; All-weather road gives a strategic fillip to Ladakh, and more</strong> - Here is a select list of stories to start the day</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>Athletic Bilbao beats Mallorca on penalties to win first Copa del Rey in 40 years</strong> - Muniain received the trophy from Spanish King Felipe VI before lifting it high for his team and fans to celebrate</p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</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>Devotees offer prayers at Nukalamma temple ahead of Kotta Amavasya festival in Vizianagaram</strong> -</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>Watch | Election season | Kejriwal arrest mainstreams AAP</strong> - In this episode of Talking Politics, we discuss the political implications of the arrest of Arvind Kejriwal in the election season</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>PDP names candidates for three Jammu and Kashmir seats, fields Mehbooba against Ghulam Nabi in Anantnag</strong> - The National Conference has fielded influential Gujjar leader Mian Altaf Ahmad from the seat and the Apni Party has named Zaffar Iqbal Manhas. The BJP has not announced its candidate so far</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>Officers to issue notice to Satwik’s grandfather for not covering borewell</strong> - Notices will be issued to gram panchayat officials who did not take action against the farmer.</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>Minister Komatireddy campaigns for Chamala Kiran setting aside his ‘disappointment’</strong> - Minister was expecting the ticket for someone in his family</p></li>
</ul>
<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>Russia-friendly populist elected Slovak president</strong> - Peter Pellegrini accused his rival of being a warmonger who would send Slovak soldiers to fight in Ukraine.</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>Athletic beat Mallorca on penalties to win Copa del Rey</strong> - Athletic Bilbao end their run of six successive Copa del Rey final defeats as they earn a dramatic penalty shootout victory over Mallorca to end their 40-year wait for silverware.</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>Danish hippy commune fights back against drug gangs</strong> - Locals start digging up a Copenhagen street as part of a bid to tackle drug-related crime.</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>Greta Thunberg arrested at Dutch climate protest</strong> - The activist was placed on a bus with fellow detainees and driven away from a protest at The Hague.</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>Thousands evacuated as dam burst worsens Russia floods</strong> - Authorities say they are working to stem flooding in Orsk, about 1,800km southeast of Moscow.</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>Why are there so many species of beetles?</strong> - Diet played a key role in the evolution of the vast beetle family tree. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=2015249">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Claims of TikTok whistleblower may not add up</strong> - He only worked there 6 months and many of his allegations are improbable at best. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=2015275">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>NASA knows what knocked Voyager 1 offline, but it will take a while to fix</strong> - “Engineers are optimistic they can find a way for the FDS to operate normally.” - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=2015200">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>$158,000 ALS drug pulled from market after failing in large clinical trial</strong> - The drug is now unavailable to new patients; its maker to lay off 70% of employees. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=2015321">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Apple now allows retro game emulators on its App Store—but with big caveats</strong> - It’s probably not the Wild West of game emulation you’re hoping for. Here’s why. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=2015269">link</a></p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
<ul>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Two lawyers walk into a restaurant</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Two lawyers walk into a restaurant, sit down at a table, order a coffee and pull out sandwiches from their suitcases. An angry waitress approaches them, exclaiming “Excuse me, you can’t eat your own food here!” The lawyers look at her, then at each other and exchange the sandwiches.
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Botosup"> /u/Botosup </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1by1jb8/two_lawyers_walk_into_a_restaurant/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1by1jb8/two_lawyers_walk_into_a_restaurant/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Dad shark is teaching his son to hunt humans</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Dad: so when you see a human, you menacingly circle around him 6-7 times, then you go for the kill
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Son : why not just circle once and go for it?
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Dad : he will still be full of shit by then
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Bamtast1c"> /u/Bamtast1c </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1bxrozp/dad_shark_is_teaching_his_son_to_hunt_humans/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1bxrozp/dad_shark_is_teaching_his_son_to_hunt_humans/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Gorrila walked into a bar.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
A big Silverback gorrila walked into a bar , a grumbled, “give me a beer.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
The bartender poured him a beer, “that will be $ 6 please.” The gorrila grumbled and reluctantly tossed out a $10 bill.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
The bartender said , “say we don’t get many gorrilas in here.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
The gorrila said, “yeah, and at these prices you’re not likely to get many more.”
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Independent-Cloud822"> /u/Independent-Cloud822 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1by2hm7/gorrila_walked_into_a_bar/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1by2hm7/gorrila_walked_into_a_bar/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>In the XVI century a widow named Ana was found guilty of pleasuring herself with an exotic fruit. She was immediately Banned from her community.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
As no one knew the name of the fruit, they decided to call it the Ban Ana fruit.
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/e-bio"> /u/e-bio </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1bxloei/in_the_xvi_century_a_widow_named_ana_was_found/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1bxloei/in_the_xvi_century_a_widow_named_ana_was_found/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>I came home from the pub and told my wife the postman had been boasting how he’d slept with every married woman on our street except one</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
she said ‘I bet it’s that Mrs Jacobs next door, the snobby cow.’
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/feelingdrawsy"> /u/feelingdrawsy </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1bxardj/i_came_home_from_the_pub_and_told_my_wife_the/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/1bxardj/i_came_home_from_the_pub_and_told_my_wife_the/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
</ul>
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