HAIGHT-ASHBURY

Human cultures are a weird thing. People get together, find shared interests, and they slowly start acting like each other. I'm sure you've seen it before - a trend sweeps through the school playground and before long everyone is mimicking each other. None of us are immune to doing things that help us fit in. We're social beings to the bone, and we crave acceptance and love.

What makes a society successful is still a matter of debate. However, after a few centuries of this whole civilization thing, we've learned a few good rules. Dishonesty, corruption, and violence are not conducive to peace. Laws are necessary, and the exploitation of the powerless is wrong. Free speech should be preserved. Can you think of any other rules?

Sometimes, societies and subcultures form that are disastrously dangerous. I'd like to discuss one of these societies. This is a tale of Haight-Ashbury, the Hippie commune that devolved into debauchery. This will be a short post, but I hope it teaches you lessons about the degeneration of communities.

Background - Psychedelics in the USA

Thanks to the influence of Native Americans, psychedelic cultures in the USA primarily started with Peyote. Silas Wier Mitchell is considered one of the earliest Western writers to describe mescaline. Mitchell was an American writer and physician, and he is partially known for prescribing the rest treatment to Charlotte Perkins Gilman (who would later write of it in The Yellow Wallpaper).

Cannabis was not always tolerated in the USA and the end of the nineteenth century brought with it a wave of paranoia about the drug. Consequently, a number of anti-cannabis laws were passed at the state level in the early twentieth century. These laws were motivated by fears of Mexican immigrants and blacks committing crimes under the influence of cannabis. A large influence in the criminalization of cannabis was Harry Anslinger, the commissioner of the Bureau of Narcotics, who referenced the assumed link between the words ‘hashish' and ‘assassin' to argue for a link between cannabis and crime and largely ignored scientific work on the drug.

The Hippie Movement

The word ‘hippie' emerged in the 1950s, and it references any individual whose attitude toward the square world (a steady job, material acquisitions, and the like) was one of contempt. Hippies continued many of the anti-authoritarian countercultural trends of the Beat Generation and repudiated conventional values because they induced status anxiety and a fetish for material acquisition. Hippies hated materialism and relying on money to live life.

Hippies established communities where they could live according to their values. An example of such a community is Haight-Ashbury, which became the epicenter of the hippie movement in San Francisco, USA. That's the community we'll discuss next.

Haight-Ashbury and the Summer of Love

When the hippie movement gained popularity, many residents of Haight-Ashbury were already living in crowded communal or cooperative arrangements. Regardless, youth flocked to San Francisco to be part of the hippie scene, to have s*x, to protest the Vietnam war, and to take drugs, particularly marijuana and psychedelic drugs. It wasn't long before the place became the main hub of the counterculture in the 1960s. In many ways, the community served as a kind of laboratory that provided advanced signals of the consequences of tendencies implicit in the movement from the start.

One of the events that made Haight-Ashbury's popularity explode was the Summer of Love. In 1967, over 100,000 teens, outcasts, and druggies took the pilgrimage to Haight-Ashbury to live out the free love fantasy they had been hearing. What did they expect? Tons of drugs, easy s*x, and the dream of leaving all their problems in the past. Plenty of notable figures showed up, including Timothy Leary and Ken Kesey. Although Leary was not the author of the psychedelics-driven countercultural movement that gripped the West in the 1950s and 1960s, he certainly was the most notorious figure in it.

Everything was good until it wasn't. With the influx of people, the community would need more food, more shelter, more medicine, and who would ensure evil didn't prosper?!

The Fall of Haight-Ashbury

Ask most people who know of this topic, and they'll tell you that the rise of amphetamine use in Haight-Ashbury was the catalyst for the community's decline. The aggressive and sometimes violent intravenous methamphetamine user was incompatible with the aspirations and lifestyle of the hippie subculture. Consequently, many of the hippies left the Haight-Ashbury to form communes that were more congenial to their lifestyle and belief systems.

News reports about Haight-Ashbury at the time are shocking to say the least:

Ten persons described by the police as "hippie types" were jailed today on murder charges after a 19-year-old girl was found dead in a Haight-Ashbury apartment.

https://www.nytimes.com/1968/12/28/archives/10-hippies-seized-in-a-r*pemurder.html?url=http://timesmachine.content-tagging.us-east-1-01.prd.dvsp.nyt.net/timesmachine/1968/12/28/76926409.html

Police and witnesses said Jiminez was the victim of a two-to-three-hour gang r*pe at the hands of at least six young men and three girls in her building, all to “teach her a lesson” for allegedly stealing her roommate's boots. She died from a blow to her temple after she was kicked, beaten and dragged down two flights of stairs.

https://www.sfgate.com/sfhistory/article/Death-at-Haight-orgy-1969-SF-gang-r*pe-murder-14539459.php

By January of 1968 most of the Hippies had abandoned the scene, and what remained were the speed users, alcoholics, thugs, lost teens and the male feminists that followed them. This didn't mark the end of the Hippie movement, but it very much made it apparent that the Hippie way of life was not perfect.

CONCLUSION

All ideologies are inherently blinding. They focus on one aspect of reality to the exclusion of others, causing distortion. Hippies realized this. They were so hopped up on love, they forgot that hate existed. The next two posts:

• FINALLY Holly Willoughby's queuegate

• Expressing my romantic desires to my crush

Greetings Dramatards

One of the many dramas which occurred during the World Cup Rugby, which the Springboks managed to claw from the opposition by just one point for 3 fricking consecutive matches, causing hart attacks for many in SA, was that during the time of celebration, where many south africans were just happy that the Springboks had managed to succeed to the semi-finals and proving that SA rugby still has talent and spunk left in them,

was when our infamous EFF leader Julius Malema said the exact most undiplomatic thing feasible, stirring a hotbet of drama in the SA rugby world.

Namely: that RSA white ancestors stole Rugby, or at least the idea or invention of Rugby, from SA indigenous peoples and took all the credit for it.

Usually when our boi Juju says something outrageous or racist or offensive, it sparks anger and rage and indignation - this time we were left with.....confusion??

Like what the frick did he mean by this, was he on drugs??

https://www.citizen.co.za/news/opinion/rugby-julius-malema-and-the-battle-over-historical-narratives

Basically it seems Julius had a problem with uniform, or at least the colours of the uniform.

“Why are we being forced to salute the emblem that was saluted by murderous people, wearing the same jersey in celebration of the butchering of black people. That emblem and that jersey represents white supremacy and that we don't support. I am not going to support anything that represents white supremacy, apartheid, anything that undermines black people. You can be part of Amabhokobhoko (the Springboks rugby team), but I'm not.”

He bitches that the Sprinkboks were having downtime after a grueling cup and rest, before going on a celebration tour for the rest of the country.

Then he moans about Bafana Bafana like a sour grape lmoa

Malema: "I will remain with Bafana Bafana until the team of South Africa is brought back into action,” Malema said. “There is talent in South Africa. Our sports teams are not performing well because it is not funded, yet white sports get all types of sponsors and that's why they thrive.” HAHAHAHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAHHAHAHAHHAH

Oh yeah the absolute corruption and mismanagement of all things Bafana Bafana related deserves its own Looongpost, but suffice to say, many cucks like Malema are sore that they have been deceisively outperformed by their Rugby and Cricket national counterparts, due to the supreme lack of meritocracy in management and the playerbase. Our boi crying about the national soccer infrastructure not getting even attention is a common trope amongst black politicians and is untrue lol

Meanwhile Captain of the Springboks (Siya Kolisi) had a more wholesome message.

https://www.news24.com/citypress/news/malema-u-turns-on-his-springboks-praise-blames-it-on-slip-in-political-consciousness-20231106

However, with the Rugby World Cup excitement having waned, Malema has made a U-turn, claiming that his praise was a "slip in political consciousness" and that he cannot support the team's name, colours and logo. Malema made these comments during a speech at the EFF Gauteng Provincial Ground Forces Forum at the Standard Bank Arena in Doornfontein on Sunday. He emphasised the importance of addressing historical injustices and ensuring that all South Africans felt represented by their national symbols. “Why are we being forced to salute the emblem that was saluted by former National Party prime minister DF Malan, to salute the emblem that was saluted by [PW] Botha, by [former National Party prime minister Hendrik] Verwoerd, by murderers who were killing our people wearing the same jersey in celebration of butchering black people. That emblem and that jersey represent white supremacy that we don't support.”

Hilariously the coloured-ethno nationalist PA leader did the opposite of Julius Malema, and praise the Springboks, saying that any past symbol of injustice their uniforms had has been washed away with time.

Here is a longwinded liberal cope-piece about how Malema is right actually

https://www.vryeweekblad.com/en/opinions-and-debate/2023-11-10-malema-and-the-boks-both-wrong-and-right

Summary: i mean he's wrong, but NOT TOTALLY WRONG!

Now I agree with the soy author - rugby was a surprisingly long history in SA, much due to Bongland's influence, and the earliest boers and bongs would play the sport in its earliest incarnations from as early as the 1800s onwards. And consequently the people who they came in contact with, and lived in colonial cities as servants or labourers or farmhands, also got exposed to colonial activities and sports like proto-rugby.

But servants and lower class peoples like black Xhosas and Sothos ect, would not be able to play alongside their earliest sports and matches, and by the time the 1950s arrived sports were completely segregated.

But again, the fact of black/coloured peeps not having fair opportunity to play rugby alongside their white peers, for at least a 100 years, is a separate issue to who invented provably a sport entire.

That's all i got, goodday

Some of this probably inaccurate. I had a hard time following what she was saying through the tears, not actually sure if she's a tumblrina, just guessing from behavior patterns and age

Cia, Oklahoma, 29

Personal Life:

• Found Caleb through TikTok

• Was in a dual income situation but spouse is currently leaving her? They were both going to be on the show?

  • Brushed over at the beginning of the show

• Since 2017, in 2019 grandma passed, she goes to North Carolina where her tribe is "Eastern Band Cherokee Indians"

  • Met cousins also in "table games" at the funeral

• Mother is Comanche

• Moved into grandma's old house when covid hit?

  • Timeline is a little weird here

  • Was also paying father $500 a month

• Other grandma gets sick, also died, she found out at beginning of 2021 died early 2023

  • She came back to Oklahoma for her?

• "So basically I've been just surviving since then, I started table games jobs when I wasn't in the right mindset" timestamp

  • "So basically what you're seeing right now I'm getting out of the depression"

  • Not sure what this even means

• "Everyone views me as the parent"

• Gets tribal benefits if she's in North Carolina?

• Household income

  • She works from Jan - early Aug at other table games job

  • Husband has been getting around 1800 on his checks

• "You guys were going to come on, what happened between your application and no-[ad break]" post-ad timestamp

  • Major waterworks here, avoid if you don't like seeing people crying

  • Not going to take notes on segment but it's beat for beat a Boogie diatribe -

    • everyone's using her

    • she's the nicest person around

    • her soon-to-be ex-husband is immature and didn't reciprocate emotional support

    • muh therapy

  • Close-up interjection from cell phone-cam Caleb timestamp

    • "blah blah blah, only one side of the story try not to be judgemental"

    • "A couple days after the episode she sent them an email saying we are in the wrong, me and my team, that we are against her, that we are the evil ones and we hope for her to not succeed essentially"

    • 

  • She and her ex will be co-tackling debt before separating with dual income

• Diabetic, lost weight on ozambiec?

Career:

• "Table Games" (Casino)

  • Blackjack dealer

  • 13/hr base, just started, 7 and a half hours a day

  • Worked at this position before asa supervisor, made 13.30 + tips (rare)?

  • 1950/month? maybe?

• Also gets tribal gibs, 20k last year but varies depending on casino preformance

Financials:

• Has a house, that's paid off

• $33'000, bought ten years ago, in Oklahoma

• Gets tribe gibs twice a year, varies depending on how casino is doing.

  • 20'000 last year, lower this year

  • June and December

• Car Loan $17,657 timestamp

  • 18% interest

  • $414 minimum payment

  • "That's uh... That was like I need to get out of the house"

  • "It's my car"

  • Chevy Spark

  • "So basically when my grandma passed away I was going to take over payments on the car which was like six hundred something"

    • "This car?"

      • "Not this car, it was like a Honda er uh Honda Accord hybrid but then my mom she wouldn't let it go so then I wanted to at least pay that six hundred try to maybe refinance it but then she let it go and that got repossessed and in the midst I'm like I need to start getting out of the house I need to start getting ready to get a job"

  • Mentioned later that both of their names are on both car loans

Car Loan 2 $32'776 timestamp

• Chevy Colarado 2021

• 813 minimum payment

• 11% interest

• Newegg $1'600 (I'm not sure) timestamp

  • "Cozy games"

    • "Like Stardew Valley, you know"

    • "Well I also like Borderlands too"

  • Bought a pre-built for 1'307.99 timestamp for thing showing

    • 35.98% interest rate

    • Currently owes 1'600

    • Has paid $154.44 so far?

      • $120 payment later mentioned through Affirm? I don't understand this

    • 787.22 minimum monthly payment?

    • Husband was the one that ordered it but it's hers?

    • Caleb mutters the specs under his breath timestamp

      • "Six core CPU"

      • 16 gigs RAM 3600 DDR4

      • 1 TB SSD

      • Nvidia 3060

• Home security (in collections)

  • was not in a good area, now in a better area

  • Didn't pay this because [storytime] timestamp

• Credit card 1 timestamp

  • Pays this off

    • "That was just for one month, I was working really hard"

  • "My grandma when she passed away I got money, I got some insurance money so I've been that's how I've been surviving is her money"

    • $30'000, has 10'000 left

  • Balance is back with a vengance, now

    • waterworks are back "every day I was like taking like edibiles and like high edibles and I was gaming" blah blah blah more boogie bullshit

    • "It's like almost maxed out"

      • It's not, it's $990 out of $1'800

  • $20 monthly payment, 28.24%

  • Buys streamer merch, some woman pronounced "Payton" who streams on Youtube?

    • I couldn't find her, just got football videos

• "Super Secret Debt" timestamp

  • About $3'000

  • Not on a payment plan, a couple years old

  • Something about someone needing documents but she never gave them the information

• iPad $500

  • 0% interest?

  • $55 a month?

  • additional $30 a month for phone bill

• Student loans $5'000

  • Federal

• Chime checking account balance -$84 => 0

• Retirement Account - $436

• Canceled subscriptions - Manta, AMC, Crunchyroll

• Has not cancelled - Hulu

• No savings

• Allegedly $800 a year in property taxes

• Doesn't have home insurance

• Caleb claims to be on a diet

Many dramanauts who followed the Daryl Brooks Saga, the Keffals crusade against Kiwifarms, or the Heard v. Depp case may already be familiar with a rather large-nosed legal streamer (Not jewish tho) named Nick Rekieta. He is the host of "Lawsplaining the Interwebz," a long-format, late-night stream where he drinks whiskey and sneeds about legal issues and court cases of our time. Nick Rekieta has seen himself involved in a number of controversies within the last year or so. In this post, I will cover the history of Rekieta, his rise, and his somewhat recent descent into lolcowdom.

>Before we can understand Nick Rekieta, we must understand what came before him.

"A Cuck and a Dick"

If you were a 90's kid on the internet, you may remember "Maddox," who I briefly mentioned in my Lowtax post. Maddox, real name George Ouzounian, was another early internet celebrity who gained a following in the late 90's/early 2000's writing comedy articles shitting on children's drawings, explaining why you should beat your kids, etc. His website was called "The best page in the Universe" and is still up today. He also wrote a book called "The Art of Manliness" which was considered funny back then but is cringe today IMO. He is mostly remembered for having a "persona" of being impossibly stubborn, retardedly overconfident, and "edgy." He was essentially famous for being a troll before there was a word for it.

"Dick Masterson," real name Dax Herrera, is a "comedian" from LA who first emerged in 2007 going on Dr. Phil and pretending to be a giga misogynist instead of just a regular misogynist like the average rDrama user. He appears to have tiny face syndrome like Charlie Kirk. You can actually see a picture of him in the formatting help section of rdrama. He wrote a book called "Men are better than women" and made a website called MenAreBetterThanWomen.com, which featured articles that explain women are dumb/ fat/ useless, etc. His appearance on Dr. Phil is pretty funny because he's like a proto Andrew Tate.

You may have noticed that both of these retards are cut from a similar cloth, both being known for playing a "character" that's entire existence is to troll people with inflammatory hot takes. On May 20th, of 2014, the two would begin a podcast together, titled, "The Biggest Problem in the Universe." The show's format involved the hosts choosing a current issue or problem in the world, and debating the other as to why their problem was worse. Maddox was liberal, neurotic as fuck, and easy to aggravate. Dick was definitely more libertarian, more laid back, and seemed to have a knack for pushing Maddox's buttons. The show was actually really successful, and had genuine potential to be a long-term thing. In their debates, Maddox would regularly lose to Dick, who would troll him by making him watch a minute of the Titanic whenever he lost. Maddox's mask would often slip as he would react with authentic butthurt to Dick's chuddery. Things would get even more spicy around episode 70(ish), when Dick and Maddox would attend a wedding for one of their friends. Dick would meet and later date one of Maddox's ex-girlfriends who was present at the wedding (Dick is still with this woman to this day). This caused the rift between the two hosts to deepen into a trench, with Maddox ending the show on episode 104. Maddox went scorched Earth with Dick, calling him as a rapist and trying to out him as an unironic misogynist to their gay little LA improv circle, which he was able to do successfully.

Dick and Maddox would start up their own podcasts; "The Dick Show" and "The Best Debate in the Universe," respectively. While Maddox would refuse to talk about his fallout with Dick on his new program, Dick Masterson would spill the tea about working with Maddox, and his show blew up because of it, with his patreon hitting five figures in a matter of days. Maddox's show would go on to be gay and lame. As the tension rose between the two, their fanbases would begin to antagonize eachother.

Maddox did an entire rant back on May of 2016 about the word "cuck" and how much he hated that word, and how angry and upset it made him. Obviously, Dick's fans would run with this, calling Maddox a cuck repeatedly online and even in real life. One of Dick's fans made a parody of Maddox named "MadCucks," which incensed Maddox to the point where he decided to sue Dick, his fans, and everyone else involved for the sum of $400 million, in a court case now infamously referred to as the "lolsuit." His court filing was so poorly worded that it was thrown out by the judge, but not before Dick's fans could weigh in on it and make fun of Maddox even harder. The "lolsuit" deserves it's own sneediumpost, but that will be another time.

RACKETS

One of these "Dick Heads" was an attorney from rural Minnesota by the name of Nicholas Robert Rekieta, also known as "Rackets." Nick, who owned a small law firm called "Rekieta Law," made a half hour video analyzing the lolsuit. Dick would feature Rekieta on the show to discuss the case, and the lawyer would become a fan favorite, with fellow "Dick Heads" encouraging Nick to continue to effortsneed about the case. Nick would begin to stream about the details of the lolsuit to a small but dedicated group of "Dick Heads" who were also legal nerds.

Nick's small following began to grow from his lolsuit coverage, and in late 2017, would begin to make a point to read EVERY SINGLE SUPERCHAT that he received. This is considered standard practice today, but in 2017, superchats were more of a novelty. "Real streamers" were already on Twitch, while Youtube creators preferred releasing vlog/podcast style content. Nick's viewers would stay tuned to hear him read their superchats, and this would facilitate the uncomfortably parasocial dynamic that Nick is known to have with his fans to this day.

THE RISE

As the lolsuit came to a conclusion, Nick would begin to branch out into other legal drama, including Comicsgate and the Russell Greer v. Taylor Swift suit. In 2019, he would begin covering "ANIMEGATE," a controversy in which a famous anime voice actor would sue Funimation for defamation. I will post about animegate at a separate time, but for now here's a crude synopsis:

You see, the American anime dubbing industry had quietly become slowly infested with SJWs for years, and this was becoming evident in the "translations" of some shows that seemed to have a political bend that happened to suit the agenda of the progressive left (such as "gamergate" references in "Prison School" which were not present in the original Japanese dub).

In an industry that was frought with pronoun pins and purple hair, Vic Mignogna stood out. He was a devout Christian man who would hold bible studies for interested fans at anime conventions. He was the voice of Edward Elric, one of the most iconic protagonists in all of anime, and he was known to be a genuinely nice guy. He also had an insane amount of fan girls on his anime weeaboo ballsack. Unfortunately, this would make him a target, and he would be run out of the industry.

On January 16th, a twitter used by the name of HanLeia accused Vic of being "a homophobic rude asshole who has been creepy to underage female fans for over ten years and I've been screaming about this since 2010 but every year nothing changes." The next day, random internet BPD girl "Marzgurl" tweeted at Funimation to "reconsider hiring Vic in the future" based off of HanLeia's tweet, and later began the #kickvic hastag. Then on the 30th, an article would be posted outlining the allegations from the previous tweets, using pictures of Vic posing with female fans at conventions as proof of sexual abuse (tbh the kissing fans on the cheek shit is pretty strange but it's apparently something he does with alot of his fans). Funimation's voice actors then mobilized run Vic out of the company based on essentially false allegations.

The voice actress who played Bulma (Monica Rial) would straight up accuse Vic of raping her, but refused to elaborate or provide any evidence whatsoever. Another actress, Jamie Marchi, would do the same, later tweeting that treating someone as innocent until proven guilty "supports rape culture." Vic would make a public apology at a convention in response to the allegations, to no avail. Vic would then begin to get banned from Anime conventions left and right, and his fans were even told on twitter by the official Pensacon twitter account that they would be arrested if they attended the anime convention and made statements supporting Vic, claiming that they "have eyes everywhere."

Samantha Inoue-Hart, a translator at Funimation who was personally involved in the interal investigation against Vic, posted a picture of her smashed in front door to twitter saying Vic supporters had swatted her home. Internet cybersleuths were able to uncover that this picture was from three years prior when her house was burglarized, and that no police report even existed, making her claim literal defamation on behalf of Funimation She would backtrack on the Anime News Network, but it was obvious what was going on at this point.

Many chud adjacent drama youtubers like Quarterpounder, Yellowflash, and of course, OUR BOY Rackets would begin to cover this controversy. Nick especially got involved with the case, using his platform to raise over a quarter of a million dollars for Vic's legal defense. Things were looking good for Vic, and by extension, Rekieta. However, what should have been a decisive legal victory for Vic was ruined by the fact that Nick would recommend his family probate lawyer, "Ty Beard," to represent Vic in his defamation case. Ty would go on to lose the case literally because he fucked up the paperwork.

Nevertheless, Nick's star continued to rise. By November 2021, Nick was seen as a major player in the "lawtuber" meta, and many copycat channels sprang up, mostly other lawyers who wanted to start a legal career reading case briefs and superchats in their underwear. All these dudes were fighting to be featured on Nick's stream. Some of Nick's regulars included Drexel, a black dude who is all about MGTOW shit and Ty Beard, the lawyer who fucked up the Anime guy's case.

November 1st marked the beginning of the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, and Nick would stream each day of the trial with a panel of these "lawtubers." While other streams provided a feed of the trial and nothing else, Nick restreamed the trial and his panel reacted with legal commentary, being one of the only prominent legal channels to do so. He would hit RETARDED levels of concurrent views, maxing out at over 100,000 viewers during his trial coverage, much to the chagrin of more established legal news outlets. This man sitting in a guest room wearing an earbud mic and using a webcam was outperforming a major media company like "Law and Crime Network." People came for the trial coverage, but many stayed because Nick came across as a very likeable, down to earth, family man . A father of 5 who married his high school sweetheart, he was seen as an exemplar of the conservative way of life for his young chud viewers, and his burgeoning wine mom fanbase liked him for his nerdy charm and wit. He also had a tendency towards shock jock humor that many found endearing. He would listen to the hardships of his viewers and offer his condolences and advice, and he seemed to be an authentic, affable dude.

It is important to note that Nick's streams have almost always been accompanied by alcohol. Specifically, whiskey. While in the beginning of his streaming career, Nick would enjoy a few drinks over the course of the evening, but the drinking would continue to ramp up consistently over time. By 2022, Nick's alcoholism would begin to get out of control.

With his channel swelling with new viewers, Nick would then cover the Amber Heard v. Captain Jack Sparrow suit throughout 2022. During this time, Nick's channel would begin to face a backlash from pro-Amber Heard activists, many of whom were fellow lawtubers that didn't like Nick and wanted a reason to take him down a peg. Media matters also wasn't a big fan of this chud lawyer lawsplaining about Alex Jones. Other people just really didn't like Nick constantly using words like "retard" and "faggot" in his streams. His channel would be targeted by frivolous copyright claims. After writing a nasty, profanity laced letter to Youtube following a bogus copyright takedown notice, Youtube would strike suspend his channel for his conduct in the summer of 2022. After this strike expired, he would receive two more in rapid succession later that year. Nick needed to play it safe with his channel or face losing it all. This would require some restraint and tact, which is not easy to maintain under an increasing drinking habit. In September, an encounter with a level 100 tranny would almost send Nick into the shadow realm forever.

KEFFALS

@keffals, a tranny streamer famous for supposedly getting destiny kicked off of twitch, would have a beef with a website known as Kiwifarms, which is like our site but with much less gayness and much more autism. Kiwifarms had a write up on Keffals, which included the following allegations: >Keffals is a commie activist. >Dabbles in fart porn. >"I'm gonna trans your children bitch" >Spent some of dying father's life savings to pay for fronthole surgery in Thailand. >Is addicted to opioids (probably due to fronthole surgery) >Had a discord server that grooms minors called "catboy ranch," where members would be mailed a handmade collar necklace made by Keffals himself. >Friends with someone named "Bobposting" who proudly supplies minors with homemade estrogen. >Is Canadian

In August of 2022, Keffals would try to leverage his newfound clout following his perceived triumph over Destiny to get Kiwifarms kicked off the internet. Considering the nature of Kiwifarms, being a living archive of nearly every embarrassing thing any internet person has done, ever, many people have wanted to see the site shuttered for quite some time now. One of the site's supporters during this time was the Racketman himself, who had featured Joshua Moon, the Farm's admin and OOperator, on his stream multiple times. Many Kiwis would also watch Nick's streams to keep up with other lolcow drama, and he had maintained a positive image on the site up to this point.

On September 2022, Nick Rekieta would get plastered and proceed to read the OP (writeup) for Keffals on Kiwifarms during his stream. When he got to the part about DIY HRT, Nick would comment, "Keffals needs to go up on the fucking wall with all the other MAPS and child molesters."

This comment right chyear would get Rekieta banned from youtube once again, and he would get his second strike, as this statement was deemed as a threat of violence.

In October 2022, the Minnesota Bar Ethics board would open up an investigation into Rekieta after receiving over 50 formal complaints. It was revealed that the complaints against this Bar association were from Keffals tranny supporters and people that just didn't like him for whatever reason. Nick would read these complaints aloud on his stream, along with the name of the complainants ,which are considered public record. Despite this, Youtube would grant Nick his third and final strike, seemingly banning him from Youtube forever for "doxxing" the retards that made frivolous complaints against him.

Nick would get his channel back, but realized that he would be spending the rest of his Youtube career dealing with bullshit, and eventually decided to move over to Rumble, which his chud audience happily moved over to as well.

So to recap, Nick up to this point had developed a reputation as a small town lawyer who became a successful Internet personality for his legal opinions, edgy humor, and the fact that he was a relatable family man who really seemed to care about his viewers. He was well liked and respected by his lawtuber community and Kiwifarms considered him a friend of the site. He was also given a lucrative exclusivity deal on a chud version of Youtube. This is where is all would begin to unravel...

HEDO NICK

In early November on 2022 while still on Youtube, Rekieta had announced that him and his wife were on vacation at a resort in Jamaica, and did a stream from their room. Kiwi cyberautists were quickly able to ascertain based on the room's layout that their streaming location was in fact a Swingers club in Jamaica known as "Hedonism II." I'll allow my boomer coomer friend "Hedo Rick" give you all the rundown on Hedonism II. Kiwis would begin to speculate about Nick's personal life. Specifically, his relationship with his wife, "Lady Rackets." Until recently, she has only been referenced in passing by Nick, but hadn't been featured on the stream until now. It was interesting to see the fabled "Lady Rackets" for the first time. She was dressed like an 18 year old from 2008 and had some godawful tattoos and a boob job. Still, she looked amazing for being the mother of 5 children and seemed to enjoy the attention from her husbands audience. Kiwis discovered that the couple was apparently staying at this swinger resort during "interracial week," and speculation began into whether or not Rackets may be a C U C K. "Woman on the internet syndrome"

Nick had a "Locals" page, which is like a Patreon. He would do exclusive, candid streams and the community would engage with Nick and eachother. As mentioned previously, Nick has a large amount of winemoms in his fanbase, and one of them by the name of "Mandy" would post her boobs to the Locals chat. After seeing the attention Mandy received, the other winemoms started posting lewds in return. Lady Rackets would get in on the action as well:

Some of the members of the Locals chat teased Nick and said Lady Rackets should open up an OF. Other members expressed their dissatisfaction with all the thirst posts, and Nick promptly told them to get fucked and stop being puritanical prudes, and that if they didn't like it, they were the problem. At this point, a lot of casual viewers would begin to tune out, or start hatewatching him instead, and only his weird, parasocial fans would remain.

THE FALL(DO)

My favorite piece of Nick lore, and his first descent into legitimate cowdom was with his "Locals exclusive" review of the "Balldo," a device which you place your ballsack into in order to fuck someone with your balls. A unholy device, coomerbrained in it's conception, the Balldo has become a symbol of Nick's transformation from well-liked conservative dad streamer to coomer boomer. In a matter of about 4 weeks, Nick, a guy who would regularly comment on social degeneracy, was outed as probable swinger, with a non-trad lifestyle that many of his chud viewers had previously admired him for. He also fricks his wife, and possibly other women, with his ballsack. Look, if you're into this kind of shit, more power to you, but it's one thing to grandstand about a particular way of life, brag about going to Church every Sunday, and then all of a sudden unapologetically broadcast your degenerate lifestyle to everyone and expect them to accept it. Most people don't care to know about it to be honest, it's not why they watch his content.

In December of 2022, Nick would get sued by Steve "Montagraph" Quest, one of the retards that filed a complaint against the Minnesota Bar association. "Monty" is known for filing bullshit complaints and lawsuits against people he doesn't like, and this would be no different. He would sue Nick for defamation, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and negligent infliction of emotional distress, due to Nick reading Monty's complaint on stream. Nick would start a gofundme for his legal defense, seeking about $50,000. It had only reached about $12,259 as of November 9th, while Monty's sits at $13,000 (lol) People didn't really want to donate because: 1. Nick is an attorney himself (granted it's always better to not represent yourself) 2. Nick is a multimillionaire. 3. Nick was (kind of) asking for it commenting that Monty should "be shot in the head."

This legal dispute is still ongoing, but Nick comments on it frequently in his streams, which many people are tired of hearing about. Between this and his coomer shenanigans bring revealed in November, his streams would seem to sidetrack more to the drama in HIS life instead of relevant, current legal drama. New drama would begin to emerge, along with some old friends...

ENTER THE RIPPAVERSE

"Rippa," also known as Eric July, is a former contributor for the chud-owned "Blaze Network." He rose to fame by reporting on "Comicsgate" and commenting on culture war nonsense in the American comic book industry. He wrote a comic book series, called "ISOM," a story about a black superhero, and launched a kickstarter for the project. The series was the first in what was planned to be an entirely new universe, a "non-woke" competitor to the current capeshit being shat out in current year. People believed in the "Rippaverse," and his Kickstarter raised over 3.7 million dollars by July of 2022. Eric would invest $300,000 of his own money into the project, and frontloaded the cost of the production, so backers would only have to wait a couple months for the comic to launch. A large portion of the proceeds were to go to charity. The comic would be released in October 2022 to mixed reviews. Fan praised the stunning quality of the illustrations, the story being pretty cohesive, and the pacing being good for a 100-page graphic novel. Critics noted the lack of information surrounding the character's origins, his motivations being almost non-existent, and a lackluster ending. Still, many people would see this as a successful campaign, and a promising start to an alternative comic book company.

Not everyone would be happy for Eric's success, including Dick Masterson and his disgusting cohost Vito.

THE BIGGEST FAGGOTS IN THE UNIVERSE

At this point, Dick's career was more or less a joke, and only really thrived on drama that the show itself would create, like having Ethan Ralph come on and sperg out, or more infamously, Dick making and defending insanely retarded, inflammatory hot takes, like defending Netflix's "Cuties." Dick's entire "persona" is being a contrarian, and decided pedophilia would be his next frontier for some reason. People were becoming less interested in the show as it had devolved into a circus of failed LA comics and lolcows sneeding and cackling at eachother like middle aged hyenas. Dick decided to relaunch "The Biggest Problem in the Universe" with an insufferable, fat tub of shit co-host named Vito, who I will be covering here shortly.

Vito "The Pedo" Gesualdi is a gross, soy /pol/ meme made manifest. A self admitted pedophile, and greasy ball of shit, his entire existence on the show is to make Dick look good by comparison. Vito had been coping and sneeding about Eric July HARD for about a year prior to the release of ISOM, as he as working on his own capeshit comic project called "Superkiller" (which looks like absolute dogshit btw). While Eric July soaked up millions from all of the comicsgate paypigs, and was able to hire industry level illustrators, Vito was struggling to get his gay comic crowdfunded. Vito was also salty that Eric was able to leverage his social capital as a conservative media contributor into appearing on multiple media outlets to promote ISOM. Vito was just a cohost on a niche, dying podcast with a balding manchild comedian, and not even their own fans gave a fuck about his shitty comic.

In the summer of 2023, Dick decided to go after Eric July as well when "ISOM's" second campaign was announced. Dick and Vito claimed:

1. Eric July was scamming the backers, saying the profits would go to charity and then keeping the proceeds (this has never been supported by any evidence, and the charity supported by the comic has put out a statement denying any wrongdoing on Eric's part) 2. The comic book is terrible (Neither Dick or Vito have even read the comic) >Correction, they HAVE read the comic 3. Dick literally says he was going to go after Eric July anyway "because I'm a psychopath"

Dick and Vito would smear Eric July on their podcast (and other shows, including Rekieta's). One "Dick Head" would even go to Eric July's Grandfather's gravesite to pose and take pictures and post it on the /r/biggestproblem subreddit. His Grandfather was named "Isom," the name of the titular character in July's comic.

Needless to say, Eric July wasn't thrilled about this. In addition to dealing with these balding, fat unfunny retards constantly sneeding about his comic, and their fans disrespecting his ancestor's resting place, AND fucking with his business, Eric would be SUED by the "International School of Ministries," or "ISOM," for trademark infringement, claiming his comic book infringed on their organization's namesake.

In September 2023, Eric July would go on to Nick's stream to discuss this lawsuit against him. Rekeita was hoping to milk this situation for new viewers, like he did with the chud anime community during "Animegate," but the discussion would inevitably lead to a "dickscussion" about the recent drama surrounding the Dick boys.

In the beginning of the stream, Eric asked Nick if he thought what Dick and his people were doing was "fucking with [his] business." Nick would dance around the question, argue like a lawyer, and REFUSE to badmouth Dick or even admit that he or his cohort had done anything malicious. Eric was particularly incensed at the fact that Dick had accused him of fraud purely to fuck with his business, and not because he had credible evidence of fraud. Nick would refuse to admit that this was malicious conduct. You see, Nick got started by being featured on Dick's show, so he doesn't want to do anything to jeopardize that relationship. The two would argue for almost an hour back and forth, and would not see eye to eye.

WHITEBREAD ASS NIGGAS

Another "Dickhead" named "Riley" (who is a producer for the Dick Show) had started a line of clothing called the "Clippaverse," the joke being that Eric July needed "clippers" as he is a particularly hairy man. This is hilarious because you can clearly see Riley is not only quite hairy himself, but a disgusting butter golem neckbeard loser who really doesn't have the authority to judge anyone's appearance. Someone at the "Rippaverse" filed a DMCA takedown request of the "Clippaverse" merch, and the web shop was taken down (tbf I think this would be fair use on Clippaverse's behalf, due to parody). In response, Riley would show up late one late September night to Eric July's comic book warehouse in Texas and put stickers on his windows, along with $41, calling it an "in-person superchat."

(A fun fact about Riley is that he's dating an autistic girl named "Mintsalad" that once called into the Dick show when she was 17 to discuss her parents threatening to kick her out of the house over discovering her drawing furry porn. Dick told her to choose furry porn over her family, which she promptly does, runs away from home at 18, and begins having a relationship with Riley, who is in his thirties. Riley now pimps out the mentally handicapped girl on OF.)

Eric the Rippa would do a stream reacting to this, sneeding in ebonics, and mentioning that Riley is lucky he didn't get shot, because in Texas you can legally shoot someone who is vandalizing your business (). Eric would continue to sneed about Nick and Dick, referring to them as "white bread ass niggas." Eric would close the segment saying he was done with Rekieta.

Nick would react to this stream on his show, losing his shit, and going on a tirade about how he "grew up around poverty" and that he "knows the fucking streets" (which is hilarious because he's wearing a gay pink polo shirt during this rant, and also his grandparents and parents are worth millions of dollars and Nick grew up in a gated community).

Nick would go on to say that Rippa made the great mistake of "feeding into the bullshit and getting butthurt."

FEEDING INTO THE BULLSHIT AND GETTING BUTTHURT

By this time (October 2023), Nick's reputation on Kiwifarms had sunk pretty low. Kiwis had embraced their formerly favorite chud lawyer as their newest lolcow for almost a year now. Nick had taken note of the Farm's newfound mockery towards him, and would start livestreaming while absolutely trashed in his hot tub, calling Josh Moon a faggot and hoping he loses his case against Russell Greer (I am NOT getting into this one right now, but it's frivolous).

Nick's sexual deviancy, "Dick"-riding, and grifting had become popular topics of discussion amongst Kiwis, and his cringekino streams would be clipped and featured prominently on the Lolcow podcast "Kino Casino."

This show is pretty retarded, but the hosts have this term that they like to use, "Felted." I like this word. It means losing everything, usually in the context of a poker game, but not always. As in, "Lowtax was FELTED at the end of his life."|

I think Nick will have a pretty fantastic downfall here soon. His drinking is getting out of hand, the dude looks like shit, and he's losing his fans steadily for over a year now. At one point he was just a small town lawyer from Minnesota, now he seems to exist in a perpetual tempest of drama of his own creation.

If you made it this far, bless you. I will provide Nickposts as more significant updates emerge with this guy.

TL,DR:

I had a dream about fricking writing a drama post.

You've probably heard the mantra before: "R*pe isn't about s*x, it's about power". I have and I fully disagree with it. In this short post, I'd like to explain why.

SUSAN BROWNMILLER

So where did the theory that r*pe is power come from? It was originally used in Susan Brownmiller's text titled Against Our Will where she makes the declaration that “r*pe is about power, not s*x.” She argues that r*pe is an attempt for men to seize power and control over women, making it a deeply misogynistic act. To Susan, r*pe is like lynching to blacks.

KATHARINE BAKER

To begin my argument, I'd like to point you to an article by Katharine Baker and published in the Harvard Law Review. The article is called "Once a male feminist?" and it investigates why male feminist do what they do. She begins by pointing out that the use of violence doesn't equate to a desire for power. It is a natural human behavior we are all guilty of (because it works):

She also points out that when men try to r*pe, they are often trying to have s*x. They have no interest in power - they genuinely just want to coom:

Katharine also finds that in a culture where s*x is commodified, r*pe is tantamount to theft. That is to say, one r*pes with the mindset of a thief - you are simply taking what isn't yours.

She has evidence to back up her claims. She argues that “thirty-nine percent of convicted male feminists were caught in the course of a robbery. As many of these men conceded, they r*ped because she was there. They were already breaking the laws of trespass and ownership- why not take one more thing?” In other words, the commodification of s*x leads to s*x being part of the loot that can be grabbed alongside jewelry and other valuables. The desire here isn't power, but s*x itself.

She also points out the biggest factor that contributes to r*pe - alcohol. This has been known and studied for ages.

• At least 50 percent of student sexual assaults involve alcohol.

• Approximately 90 percent of r*pes perpetrated by an acquaintance of the victim involve alcohol.

• About 43 percent of sexual assault events involve alcohol use by the victim; 69 percent involve alcohol use by the perpetrator.

• In one-third of sexual assaults, the aggressor is intoxicated.

https://alcohol.org/health-effects/sexual-assault-college-campus

Genuinely unironically, if you want to not be r*ped avoid alcohol and people who drink. As Katharine writes:

https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/79433623/viewcontent-libre.pdf

On a somewhat unrelated note, Katharine Baker also has an article about why r*pe shouldn't be a crime and it's a good read.

https://www.minnesotalawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Baker_ONLINE.pdf

RICHARD FELSON

Richard Felson directly looks at the claim that r*pe is power. He argues that this is not the case, and that male feminists are primarily coomers. As evidence, he begins looking at the average age that women are r*ped. It just so happens to align with their peak attractiveness. A sexual motivation explains this, not a power-based one.

Thus he comes to the following conclusion:

Sexual offenders of all ages prefer young victims. Even elderly offenders target 15-year-olds the most. Also, men who commit sexual assault tend to be considerably older than men who commit other types of violent crimes. The relatively high rate of sexual offending by older men is likely due to the fact that they have become less attractive with age while their sexual attraction to young people is undiminished. The men and women they find most attractive are not attracted to them. Some of them use force to get their way.

On a side note, Felson also points out an interesting fact. The biggest determinant of whether you will be r*ped is your age, not gender. A teen boy is more likely to be r*ped than a woman in their 40s.

Sexual assault is as much a crime against young people as it is a crime against women. A 15-year-old male is more likely to be a victim of a sexual assault than a 40-year-old female.

https://web.archive.org/web/20210225113056/https://quillette.com/2016/01/02/to-r*pe-is-to-want-s*x-not-power

CONCLUSION

This isn't complicated. I don't know how a simple topic got so twisted.

>I don't want you alive, thus I kill you

>I want what you have, thus I steal

>I want to coom, thus I r*pe

The idea that someone can achieve a full erection and copulate yet not be sexually motivated is ridiculous. And this applies to prison r*pe as well. Those male feminists are GAY or at least BISEXUAL. Are there sadists out there who r*pe simply because they enjoy the pain of others, or because they hate women? Of course they are. But to characterize r*pe as a whole as a crime of power as opposed to a crime of s*x is unfounded. IT'S A S*X CRIME.

Tune in next time when we discuss Holly Willoughby's queuegate.

˚༺☆༻*ੈAN ANALYSIS OF THE CRUCIFIXION OF JESUS CHRIST ˚༺☆༻*ੈ

Who is the most famous historical figure? Who altered the path of human history forever? Who is the most quoted man ever, who is the most worshipped, who has made the biggest contributions to world philosophy? Only one name can be given as a genuine answer - Jesus.

In modern times, many have turned their backs on Jesus and his teachings, but his influence has yet to wane. I am here today to demonstrate that the story of Jesus is not a boring one. Instead, it is filled with plenty of drama, betrayal, humor, lust, and heroism. We'll be mainly looking at one event - his death - but to do this, we'll need to discuss the sociopolitical conditions that led to the Jew being crucified. To close off, we'll look at the medical side of his death to hopefully determine just what precisely killed him.

Our tale will involve the following main characters:

• Jesus

• Simon

• Peter

• Judas

• Pontius Pilate

• King Herod

As you understand, the Biblical story of Jesus Christ's life is steeped with supernatural beliefs and religious claims (some of which contradict each other). Consequently, it is hard to separate fact from fiction. To the best of my abilities, I will rely on secular historians, though, as you'll see, I have some problems with their research as well.

Enjoy!

Part One - Setting the Stage

Who is Jesus Christ?

The individual we will be discussing is named Jesus. During his lifetime, Jewish individuals typically had one name, and if there was a second name it was related to their birthplace, father, or occupation. Hence, Jesus would have been called Jesus of Nazareth, or Jesus of Joseph, or Jesus the Carpenter. Commonly, he is referred to as Christ, which is derived from the Greek word Christos meaning “anointed”. The title references the fact that Jesus is believed to be an anointed Messiah.

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Quick notes from Holly!

The story of Jesus' life spans four books in the Bible: Matthew, John, Luke, and Mark. Though they agree on some pain points, they also present wildly differing claims at times, with some claims contradicting the claims of other Gospels.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke are typically grouped as the Synoptic Gospels because they contain mostly the same narrative. John differs a lot, contradicting the Synoptic Gospels at many points. Was this a case of writers drawing from different sources? Have we been fooled by forgeries? You'll have to come to your own conclusions.

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His parentage is debated. It is widely believed that his mother is Mary, a Jewish woman from Nazareth. Jesus' earthly father is Joseph, a descendent of King David. Biblically, it is believed that Jesus was conceived via immaculate conception, and Mary had not known a man when fell pregnant.

It doesn't help that the Bible offers differing accounts of Jesus' genealogy across the four Gospels (more on that in a bit). In the Book of Matthew, we are treated to a patriarchal genealogy that traces Jesus' ancestry all the way back to Abraham and Sarah. However, in the Book of Luke, we find a longer genealogy that traces Jesus' ancestry back to Adam. It is as such:

• Adam

• Seth

• Enos

• Cainan

• Mahalaleel

• Jared

• Enoch

• Methuselah

• Lamech

• Noah

• Shem

• Arphaxad

• Cainan

• Shelah

• Eber

• Peleg

• Reu

• Serug

• Nahor

• Terah

• Abraham

• Isaac

• Jacob

• Judah

• Perez

• Hezron

• Arni

• Admin

• Amminadab

• Nahshon

• Salmon

• Boaz

• Obed

• Jesse

• David

• Nathan

• Mattatha

• Menna

• Melea

• Eliakim

• Jonam

• Joseph

• Judah

• Simeon

• Levi

• Matthat

• Jorim

• Eliezer

• Jesus

• Er

• Elmodam

• Cosam

• Addi

• Melchi

• Neri

• Shealtiel

• Zerubbabel

• Rhesa

• Joannan

• Joda

• Josech

• Semei

• Mattathias

• Maath

• Nagge

• Esli

• Naum

• Amos

• Mattathias

• Joseph

• Jannai

• Melchi

• Levi

• Matthat

• Heli

• Joseph

• Jesus

We know that Jesus was of Jewish ethnicity, and likely had black hair, brown eyes, and brown skin. It is also somewhat certain that Mary gave birth to him in Bethlehem during the reign of King Herod.

So let's entertain the idea of a virgin birth for a moment. In modern times, this is possible without an issue through artificial insemination. Even in the past, however, Joseph could have easily impregnated Mary without having s*x with her. If they shared the same bed and he had a nocturnal emission, or if they practiced non-penetrative forms of intimate contact.

The other possibility, of course, is that Mary had s*x with someone other than Joseph, and then claimed immaculate conception. The most common form of the argument claims that Jesus' father was a Roman soldier named Tiberius Julius Abdes Pantera.

I tend to not believe this, mainly because it seems to be the case that most people did not believe Jesus was of virgin birth. In John 6, we hear the crowd say:

They were saying, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven'?”

My argument is that it would have been just as ridiculous then as it is now to make such a claim. If one fell pregnant, it would almost certainly not be the first excuse you jump to.

Did Jesus exist?

In my opinion, yes. Jesus did exist and he was the son of Mary. His father is unknown. One of the best sources of evidence for the historicity of Jesus is Tacitus who was a Roman historian and scholar. In his text Annals, he writes of the crucifixion of Jesus and the rule of Pontius Pilate. The following verse in particular has been taken into focus (translated from Latin):

>Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judæa, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annals_(Tacitus)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacitus_on_Jesus

This is considered a non-Christian confirmation of the crucifixion of Christ. However, it should be noted that the authenticity of Annals has been contested by scholars such as Richard Carrier (who advocates for the theory that Jesus never existed and is pure myth), but it is generally accepted that it is authentic by most scholars.

Pontius Pilate and King Herod

Pontius Pilate was the governor of Judea, and he served under Emperor Tiberius. His rule was marked by tension between him and his Jewish subjects, historians note. The Jews, with their own God and culture, were offended by Pontius's desire to remove the Jewish imperial standard and replace it with Ceaser's image. The people revolted, and Pontius sent his soldiers to kill them, but they did not flinch. Thus, he discovered that he would have to negotiate with the Jews if he was to rule over them effectively. Strongarming wasn't going to work against a population who did not fear death.

He was enemies with King Herod, the ruler who called for all children under the age of 2 to be slaughtered, causing Mary and Joseph to flee. As you'd imagine, historians consider him to be a cruel, bloodthirsty, and tyrannical ruler.

These two figures, separately, had reasons to not like Jesus. This would have deadly consequences.

Part Two - Killing the King

Jesus starts some drama

I do not wish to dwell too long on the life of Jesus and the events that occurred during his 33(?) years on Earth. Instead, I'd like to focus on the last days of his life, and the circumstances which led to this (mostly) peaceful man being nailed to a cross.

==================================================================

Quick notes from Holly!

Jesus had predicted his crucifixion many times prior. Of particular note is Mark 30-32 which states the following:

Then they departed from there and passed through Galilee, and He did not want anyone to know it. For He taught His disciples and said to them, “The Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of men, and they will kill Him. And after He is killed, He will rise the third day.” But they did not understand this saying, and were afraid to ask Him.

Kind of an edgelord thing to randomly say without any elaboration.

==================================================================

After raising Lazarus of Bethany from the dead, Jesus returns to Jerusalem and this is about the point where the true drama begins.

The miracle of the resurrection of Lazarus had drawn more believers to him than ever, and he was able to draw crowds wherever he went. He arrived riding a donkey which his disciples had gathered for him. Upon arrival, the crowds greet him with palm leaves, for they believe him to be the Son of God.

Not everybody was happy about this. Religious leaders, political leaders, and scholars felt threatened by the growing numbers turning to Jesus. Also, claiming you're the son of God is incredibly blasphemous. Most people would have been thoroughly offended by anyone making such a claim. Now imagine how a religious scholar would feel seeing a poor man drawing more crowds than a Rabbi while making those blasphemous claims! Hence, by the time Jesus arrived in Jerusalem, there was already tension.

It should be noted that Jesus wasn't particularly quiet about his arrival in Jerusalem, nor was he doing much to appease the authorities whom he knew despised him. He continued to preach his message, he publicly criticized those in power, and he kicked up a storm when he flipped tables in the table as he cursed those who had turned the place of worship into a moneylending spot. These were not the actions of a man who feared authority. It was positively suicidal.

The drama escalates

In the week leading up to the crucifixion, Jesus had the Last Supper.

During the Last Supper, Jesus is seated with his 12 disciples. These disciplines (also known as apostles) are:

1. Simon (also known as Paul)

2. Andrew (Simon's brother)

3. James

4. John (Brother of James)

5. Philip

6. Bartholomew

7. Thomas

8. Matthew (the tax collector)

9. James

10. Thaddeus

11. Simon (the Canaanite)

12. Judas

Now back to the Last Supper. Jesus breaks bread and says "Take, eat, this is my body.” He then pours wine and says “Drink from it, all of you; for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you, I will never again drink of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom.” These actions form the basis of the Holy Communion which is practiced globally every Sunday. I have performed it several times, both as a believer and non-believer. Have you?

Jesus then predicts that he will be betrayed, with some Gospels specifically fingering Judas. Matthew 26:23–25 states:

He answered, “The one who has dipped his hand into the bowl with me will betray me. The Son of Man goes as it is written of him, but woe to that one by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for that one not to have been born.” Judas, who betrayed him, said, “Surely not I, Rabbi?” He replied, “You have said so.”

Jesus also states that Peter will deny him three times, which Peter denies. However, before the sun rises, Peter will be proven a liar. In the Gospel of John, we also get an account of Jesus washing the feet of his disciples.

Following the feast, Jesus goes to Gethsemane Garden with his disciples. There, he prays to God, begging that he does not meet the terrible ordeal that is coming his way. In Matthew 26 we read:

And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping. And he said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” And again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy. So, leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words again. Then he came to the disciples and said to them, “Sleep and take your rest later on. See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 46 Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.”

It is one of my favorite verses in the Bible. You can feel the fear and tension building as Jesus begins to lose his cool and gets desperate. Despite this genuine fear, his faith does not falter and he continues with the mission.

==================================================================

Quick notes from Holly!

I hear you baying: "But what about Richard Carrier!" Frick him. Richard Carrier is a quack and a charlatan and he is widely discredited by fellow historians and scholars. Stop listening to pop intellectuals.

==================================================================

Judas arrives with an armed mob and kisses Jesus which identifies him to the mob who then take custody of him. Many scholars and Christians have asked why Judas had to identify Jesus - couldn't they simply recognize the famous Messiah who was recognized by regular citizens when he entered Jerusalem? I have no answers. Not all his disciples abandon him, and some attempt to fight the crowd, but Jesus insists that they let him be taken peacefully.

He is then taken to Pontius Pilate, and the crowds demand his crucifixion. This is when the real drama starts. The drama didn't just occur during the trial of Jesus, but continued until today, resulting in us having quite a skewed view of what occurred when Jesus was crucified.

Jesus is put on trial

Once Jesus was under arrest, the guards blindfolded him and then beat him while telling him to prophesy who hit him. He is then taken to Jewish court where he is questioned on his claims of being the son of God and the king of Jews. Luke 22 reads:

As soon as it was day, the council of the elders of the people met together, both the chief priests and experts in the law. They brought him into their Sanhedrin and said, “If you are the Christ, tell us.”

But he said to them, “If I tell you, you will not believe, and if I ask you, you will not answer me or release me. But from now on, the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God.”

They all said, “Are you then the Son of God?”

He said to them, “I am what you are saying.”

Then they said, “Why do we need any more testimony? For we ourselves have heard it from his own mouth!”

After this point, we arrive at yet another contradiction in the Gospels. Some claim that Jesus was then taken to Caiaphas the high priest. However, John's Gospel claims Jesus was taken to Annas. Regardless, we know he was questioned by the priests regarding his blasphemous claims. Jesus didn't say much, perhaps knowing that nothing he said would change fate.

==================================================================

Quick notes from Holly!

While Jesus was being beaten and questioned, there was also attention directed toward the followers of Jesus. Some remained loyal to him, including Simon who helped Jesus carry his cross.

Peter, on the other hand, deserted Jesus and denied him three times, just as the Lord had predicted. When he remembers the prophecy of his betrayal, he weeps. Jesus forgives him following his resurrection, but Peter's betrayal isn't what makes me uncomfortable about this story.

Instead, I'm vexed by the idea that one can prophesize the actions of another. Does Peter have any free will? Was he doomed to deny Jesus three times specifically? Was there any chance that Peter could do otherwise, or was it the unchangeable plan of God? I have no answers.

==================================================================

The next morning, Jesus is taken to Pontius Pilate. Most readers probably believe that Pontius was a meek man who respected Jesus. He did not want to crucify Jesus, and in fact he famously “washed his hands” of the matter.

Well, that's not the whole story. There is no reason to believe that Pontius would be even vaguely against the idea of Jesus being killed. He was probably the one person who stood to gain the most from it. As we've previously discussed, Pontius was attempting to instill Roman rule over the Jews, and to have them recognize only Roman emperors as the highest authority. This was proving to be difficult due to the religiosity of the Jews, and brutality wasn't doing the trick. The more he disrespected the culture and religion of the Jews, the harder it became to control the population.

Hence, Pontius was in a position where he needed to get rid of Jesus without making it seem like he wanted to get rid of Jesus. It had to look like the people themselves wanted Jesus gone! The first step of this plan was to send Jesus to King Herod to be questioned. In doing so, he would gain favor with the King who he was enemies with, granting him greater political power. We learn this in Luke 23: 12

That day Herod and Pilate became friends—before this they had been enemies.

King Herod had wanted to see Jesus for a long time, not because he enjoyed his teachings, but because he wanted to know just who was brave enough to undermine his authority by claiming to be the Son of God. To discover that it was a mere bastard carpenter! Jesus did not answer King Herod's questions, and his soldiers mocked Jesus by putting a robe on him. This isn't just a random move. They were literally dressing him up as a king of Jews before he was to be crucified. This wouldn't be the death of just Jesus, but the death of all Messiahs.

Jesus was then returned to Pontius, who was ready with the next step of his plan. You see, it was Passover, and it was the tradition that the governor would free one prisoner during this time. So he appeared before the crowds and presented Jesus along with a prisoner named Barabbas. He then asks the crowd to choose who must be slaughtered.

This was a trick! Barabbas is referred to using a term that means “terrorist” or “rebel”. Barabbas was likely an individual rioting against Roman rule. The majority of the crowd would be sympathetic toward him! There was no choice here.

Secondly, Jesus was presented with a robe and he was called the king of Jews. If the Jews were spared, they would be saying: “Yes, our king is a beaten bastard.” Of course, they denounced him, he had been humiliated and condemned by even the priests! Pontius knew this. He wasn't giving them an option - he was merely creating a situation in which the crowd would be electing to kill Jesus, not him.

In John 19, we see how Pontius directs the crowds to Jesus' kinghood specifically, goading the Jews into demanding the murder of their own savior:

“Here is your king,” Pilate said to the Jews.

But they shouted, “Take him away! Take him away! Crucify him!”

“Shall I crucify your king?” Pilate asked.

“We have no king but Caesar,” the chief priests answered.

Finally Pilate handed him over to them to be crucified.

A little later, we see the significance of the sign:

Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the cross. It read: jesus of nazareth, the king of the jews. Many of the Jews read this sign, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and the sign was written in Aramaic, Latin and Greek. The chief priests of the Jews protested to Pilate, “Do not write ‘The King of the Jews,' but that this man claimed to be king of the Jews.”

Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”

I'd argue that Pontius isn't as innocent as he is typically portrayed. He didn't wash his hands of the situation, and he wasn't pressured by the Jews. He made a deliberate political move, and he did it in such a way that it did not seem like he was acting against the will of the masses.

Thus Jesus was set to be crucified.

The crucifixion of Jesus Christ

It is believed that Jesus was crucified on a Roman cross. This would mean his arms were outstretched. Typically, he is depicted with nails driven through his hands, though it should be noted that this would not support the human body, and a nail would rip through the soft flesh of the hand unless he was also fastened with rope. A nail was also driven into his feet, one on top of the other.

==================================================================

Quick notes from Holly!

The ordeal did not begin with the crucifixion, far from it. Jesus was first flogged with a scourge. This alone killed many prisoners before they could even be crucified. Following this, Jesus was made to carry his cross to Golgotha. It has been estimated that a cross could weigh up to 135kgs, which makes it nearly unbelievable to consider that a tortured man could carry such a weight all the way to Golgotha.

Jesus is unable to, and eventually, Simon does the heavy lifting.

==================================================================

Jesus was placed between two Jewish criminals. In some versions of the Gospels, they jeer at Jesus with the crowd, while in other versions, one of the criminals repents. This marked the beginning of Jesus' ordeal on the cross.

There are seven sentences attributed to Jesus on the cross, and they're scattered throughout the four Gospels:

1. Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.

2. Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise.

3. Woman, behold thy son! and Behold thy mother!

4. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

5. I thirst.

6. It is finished.

7. Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.

Jesus died relatively quickly (about six hours), and his legs did not have to be broken. To verify that he was dead, a soldier drove a sword into his side.

Thus Jesus died.

What were the mechanisms of Jesus' death?

So if you were a coroner, what would you claim is Jesus' cause of death? Well, he's had nails driven through his flesh, so many would assume blood loss, but that's not the case. In fact, he wouldn't have lost too much blood from the nails themselves. Most healthy adult males could survive that just fine for 6 hours. If he did die from blood loss, it would have been from the lashings he received prior primarily.

==================================================================

Quick notes from Holly!

It was not like Jesus was unaware of the threat of crucifixion. Romans had frequently used crucifixion as a means to humiliate detractors and to strike fear into the masses. Crucifixions took place publicly, and they were designed for maximum pain and suffering. The bodies would then be left there for weeks and months until scavengers picked off the flesh and blood dried.

==================================================================

Crucifixions on their own aren't particularly deadly. Yearly, folks voluntarily crucify themselves for six hours to experience the passion of Christ, and they are fine afterward, all things considered. If you were crucified as a healthy young male, it would take you days to die from exhaustion and thirst on a Roman crucifix, which is what happened to slaves who met that fate.

The most popular theory is that he died of asphyxiation. However, more recent research suggests that this wouldn't be the case with the Roman crucifixion. You can test this out for yourself. Stretch your arms out in a Y shape and breathe in. Now try again with your hands outstretched and held together above your head. You'll notice it is harder to inhale if your hands are above you.

I am of the opinion, as many modern scholars are, that Jesus' death was a combination of both blood loss from the scourging and exhaustion from being crucified. As Edwards and Hosmer summarize:

>Jesus of Nazareth underwent Jewish and Roman trials, was flogged, and was sentenced to death by crucifixion. The scourging produced deep stripelike lacerations and appreciable blood loss, and it probably set the stage for hypovolemic shock, as evidenced by the fact that Jesus was too weakened to carry the crossbar (patibulum) to Golgotha. At the site of crucifixion, his wrists were nailed to the patibulum and, after the patibulum was lifted onto the upright post (stipes), his feet were nailed to the stipes. The major pathophysiologic effect of crucifixion was an interference with normal respirations. Accordingly, death resulted primarily from hypovolemic shock and exhaustion asphyxia. Jesus' death was ensured by the thrust of a soldier's spear into his side. Modern medical interpretation of the historical evidence indicates that Jesus was dead when taken down from the cross.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3512867

Lastly, it should be noted that the nails used to crucify Jesus were likely reused on other people, as metal was very valuable at the time. They likely recycled Jesus's nails, as his clothes were also sold, as we learn in Matthew 27:35 -

When they had crucified him, they divided up his clothes by casting lots.

Consequently, we don't have too many relics of crucifixions in modern times, as the nails (and perhaps even wood) would have been recycled.

CONCLUSION

So that is the story of Jesus' death. There was plenty more drama that came. Women wept, saints rose from the dead, and darkness fell over the Earth (at least if you believe the supernatural claims of the Bible).

Of course, this isn't the whole story, and there are plenty of gaps that have been left. However, this should be sufficient content to help you wrap your head around this historical event. It should be clear at this point that I do believe that Jesus existed, and that he had a large following, and that he was crucified. I think the historical evidence is sufficient, and that claims to the contrary are often motivated by a desire to ridicule the Bible.

If you made it this far, thank you. These posts are my only means to communicate with the outer world. I get so lonely in my apartment that it feels like my heart is going to rip out of my chest. I don't know why I'm alive or what's the point of waking up every day when everybody hates you and you've been rejected. Emotions get too much, and I don't know what to do with myself. Then the blood flows.

Tune in next time when we FINALLY discuss Holly Willoughby's queuegate.

Greetings Dramatards,

about 2 weeks there was a lot of excitement during the Rugby World Cup, when RSA managed to squeeze out a win with exactly 1 point for 3 fricking consecutive times!

But that's irrelevant, what is relevant to us is the Dramarama which occurred in the meantime.

Today we will talk about some RACISM DRAMA when during the Semi-Finals (i think 22 October? ) when RSA faced off against Engerland in the 3rd Anglo-Boer war of 2023.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/oct/22/tom-curry-accuses-south-africa-hooker-bongi-mbonambi-of-using-racial-slur

Basically a b-word mayo complained that the black giga-chad kang player Bongi Mbonambi, used a racial slur against him in the match during an altercation when the ball was being manhandled in the typical chaos when men beat each other up in the desperate hunt for the egg

Basically the pansy Tom "Turbo Cuck" Curry, moaned that Bongi had called him a "wit kant" or a "white c*nt" during the scuffle, and this made him very upset and hurt his feefees

Now unlike the plebe sport of soccer, where a lot of douchebags fake their injuries and racial slurs are a bit more common, the Rugby Union International organization very super serial seriously, so stuff like this can make news.

========(from article)

Curry can clearly be heard on a recording via O'Keeffe's microphone making the allegation of a racist slur to the official in the 28th minute of the match. He said: “Sir, sir , if their hooker calls me a white c*nt what do I do?” The New Zealander responded by saying: “Nothing please.” He goes on to add, after a short pause: “I'll be on it,” though it is unclear if he is referring to the specific incident. There is no audio available of the alleged comment by Mbonambi.

Curry was visibly shaken after the match.

When asked if something was said to him by Mbonambi, he said: “Yeah.” Pressed on what had been said, he declined to say but asked if the matter had been resolved at the end of the match – Curry appeared to go to shake hands with Mbonambi but the South African seemed to push his hand away – he added: “No. It doesn't need to be talked about. I'm not talking about it now.”

SA Rugby soon issued a statement, however. “We are aware of the allegation, which we take very seriously, and are reviewing the available evidence,” it read. “We will engage with Bongi if anything is found to substantiate the claim.”

The Springboks clinched victory with a 78th-minute penalty by Handré Pollard and at the full-time whistle one of a number of flare-ups between the two sides ensued. The England captain, Owen Farrell, clashed with South Africa's Willie le Roux but afterwards attempted to play down the incident, insisting it was just a “misunderstanding”.

If Mbonambi faces disciplinary action he could be handed a suspension in line with law 9.12 which states a player must not verbally abuse anyone. World Rugby regulations prohibit abuse based on, but not limited to “religion, colour, national or ethnic origin, sexual orientation”. World Rugby could also intervene on the grounds of “bringing the game into disrepute”.

====(end article)

LOST IN TRANSLATION:

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/oct/24/was-an-afrikaans-rugby-term-used-by-bongi-mbonambi-lost-in-translation

So the moment this came out we aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaallllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll knew the Bongoloid was completely full of shit, and making mountains out of morehills.

You see black people in South Africa do not often use english slurs or curse words at alllllllllll. They much more often use Afrikaans slurs and curses, as the Afrikaners had had such a more profound effect on their lexicon. The very english word c*nt isn't used very much normally at all, especially by black peeps here. If someone here wants to call someone a c*nt - they'll use the afrikaans variant "Poes"

Additionally, all rugby players communicate in afrikaans during play and can speak it reasonably fluently , including all the black and coloured players whom all were usually influenced by afrikaans dominated rugby institutions and schools. This has had the added benefit that few people on earth can speak or understand afrikaans, meaning their have inbuilt secret code which the opposition can't understand, which can be very useful in certain plays if the opponents cannot understand you, like often throwing in the rugby ball from the side into liners.

Additionally, "kant" which is pronounced very much the same as "c*nt" means side, and as you can imagine is used very often in a sport where communicating direction between players is important. Bongi very likely said something along the lines "left side, right side, back side" to indicate to his fellow players where to receive a passing ball, and our r-slurred bongroid interpreted it in the noise as "%&*& C*NT"

Additionally there are white lines on the sides of a rugby field, which also likely could have been what Bongi had referred to.

https://apnews.com/article/south-africa-mbonambi-rugby-world-cup-1390e406c1ba87935342fc9f1f7c382a

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/article-12721675/South-Africa-star-Bongi-Mbonambi-denies-racial-slur-Tom-Curry-World-Cup-hooker-claims-speaking-Afrikaans-slams-England-unprofessional.html

Rdrama.net is, for many of us, a very special place that is unlike the rest of the Internet. It has the soul of the old web, and it's own brand of humor that can't be found anywhere else. The site's main jannie, Carp, is genuinely hilarious and adored by the community. Despite the constant shit flinging and sneeding, there is a deep feeling of unseriousness here that is refreshing in a world that takes itself too seriously.

This article is not about this gay butt site, however, it's about another site that took the internet by storm in the early 2000s and was the genesis of many extant aspects of Internet culture. It's the story of the man who made it possible, and how his internet fame ruined him.

In November of 1999, a man by the name of Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka, a dropout from Vanderbilt University, would get fired from his job as a quake gaming journo for making fun of an old r-slurred coworker of his. With his newfound free time, he would begin to write articles and publish them on his fancy new website,

SomethingAwful.com.

SA began as a sort of ripoff of Maddox's "best page in the universe" with edgelord articles being posted nearly daily to the front page. SA had a forum where readers could comment on the articles, and it quickly drew a large following of the early denizens of the Internet, which were mostly neckbeards and edgelords. In a few short years, the forum had become more popular than the front page, with a very active community of "goons" that would create content in the forums that would feature on the front page. In 2002, Rich began charging users a $10 fee to access the forums, and the users obliged, as the fee deterred trolls and stupid children from pooping up the site. You also had to pay 5 bucks for a profile pic, but you could anonymously spend 5 bucks to change another users pfp as well, which was funny. Lowtax also banned l33tsp33k on the forums and required people to write in complete sentences.

The community became a massive success, and eventually grew to over 100,000 users. Memes, raids, "let's play" videos, and even 4chan were born from SA. Lowtax was making six figures just off of registration fees, and at this point, was still in his 20s. He had money, time, and a massive community that loved him. What could a man with so much potential do next?

Lowtax decided to start banging the female users of the site, known as "Goonnettes." In 2005, he got one of them pregnant and got married to her shotgun wedding style.

In 2006, Lowtax would have a year that would begin the downward slope of his life. Two major events would change his relationship with the site.

In March, Lowtax posted a thread to "General Bullshit," SA's general discussion board, talking about a particular brand of juice that he liked. It was a brand of "Mangosteen" juice (A mangosteen is a small purple fruit from southeast Asian btw). The users quickly realized that this was an affiliate marketing link and teased Lowtax, who reacted by throwing a temper tantrum, calling everyone cute twinks, and then deleting the post and banning everyone that made fun of him. This really soured many users of the site to Lowtax, who before this time was seen as a lovable goofy site admin.

Things got worse later that year when Lowtax would publicly accused a shitty movie director named Uwe Boll of being a child molester. Uwe had been organizing an event to box the critics of his shitty movies, and asked Lowtax if he wanted to box him. Lowtax agreed, and the two would meet in September of that year, in a shitty events center in Vancouver. Lowtax would get his butt kicked in this event, which would stream to 7000 viewers (which was unheard of in 2006. he would then sneed in the parking lot after the event in a post fight interview.

Between this incident and the Mangosteen debacle, Lowtax would post much more infrequently to the site, as he wasn't really able to live those two things down. He would begin renting a shitty strip mall office, which would be the HQ for SA. He supposedly rented the space to run the site, write articles, and make content with animator and best friend, Shmorky. Usually though, Lowtax would mostly go there to get high and stay away from his wife, who now had two children with him.

Lowtax's wife was devoutly religious, whereas lowtax was a neckbeard atheist. As Lowtax spent less time with the family, his wife would begin teaching Sunday school, much to the chagrin of Lowtax. The two would fight about religion, Lowtax's lack of doing anything other than being a drunk r-slur, and the tension would culminate in a physical altercation in 2010. At this point, his first wife would file for divorce.

The site itself, SA, was beginning to lose it's relevancy as other platforms rose in popularity. The company that went on to buy reddit offered Lowtax 14 million for the site in 2007, but he turned it down, as this site was his life's work and the community were HIS people, right?

Back on SA, the makeup of the community had begun to shift dramatically. Starting in 2008, a Kenyan man named Barack Hussien Obama ran for president against crippled war hero John McCain. The goons that supported McCain decided to wager their accounts on the election results, and after McCain lost, many of the goons that supported him (chuds) were banned from the site and never returned.

Then in 2010, a game called Dangan Ranpa released. It's an anime game about murdering teenage girls, so naturally, it was a smash hit with the s on tumblr. SA was one of the first places on the web to feature "let's play" videos. Lowtax was pissed that these tumblrites were watching his premium SA content for free, and put the "let's plays" behind a paywall. Tumblrinas needed to buy a forum membership to view the "let's plays," and many of them promptly did and never left. The word "" comes from the words and goon, and originated on SA. There was also a dedicated politics board called "Laissez Faire," but the users from this board would brigade other boards (especially the chud board, "FRICK YOU AND DIE," or FYAD), so Lowtax decided to delete the Laissez Faire which was essentially a leftist containment board) and thus, a somewhat apolitical forum culture was permeated with a leftist political slant that continues to this day.

As for Lowtax, he wasn't doing so good. He had started a shitty gaming channel called "gaming garbage" that never took off. By 2014, registration fees had dropped significantly and would not recover. His site was still running on 2002 era software, and he was too fricked up all the time to really address any issues with it. Also in 2014, Lowtax fired Shmorky, as he was starting to trans out and was doing shit like wearing a cape and a yarn wig and speaking with an extremely creepy high pitched voice. He had a schizo gf as well, and posted a video of her having an actual schizoid attack to SA, which caused the community to disown him.

In 2016, Shmorky was outed as a diaper furry scat fetishist p-dophile (really) and disappeared from the internet forever (people think he killed himself). Lowtax was beset with anger, as he had allowed Shmorky, a man who was once his best friend and someone he trusted, around his children. He took to the SA forums to talk shit about Shmorky, as he needed the cathartic release of bullying this wierdo, but the users mostly defended Shmorky because he is "non-binary" and if someone is LGBTQIAA+, cannot be made fun of even for being a sick frick.

Lowtax had realized that he had lost the community that he cared about. These new users were gay r-slurs and not cool and all the real neighbors left long ago. At this point, Lowtax decided to make a change and fix the site, but the rot was so deep it couldn't be cut out at this point. He did weird shit like segregate all the black users to a board called "negrotown." (Lmao)

In 2016, Lowtax would go to Canada to frick another goonnette. While there, he would meet Ashli, his soon to be second ex-wife. He flew her back to his hometown in Missouri and the two would be wed shortly thereafter. Lowtax wouldn't bother to complete her residency paperwork, making Ashli technically an illegal immigrant.

Ashli was not a goon, but she believed in Lowtax and though SA could be great again. He made her a mod, which pissed off the other mods, but the users seemed to actually like Ashli. She recommended that Lowtax make a patreon to raise money for SA. He already had one, so he marketed it on the forum and was began making like $15k a month from his paypigs (who could give a shit about Lowtax but like using the site.) She really wanted to light a fire under Lowtax's butt, but much like his first wife, found herself caring for a lazy, drug addicted manchild who spent his time and money on dumb shit, like rented sports cars and luxury cakes. He chose to bask in the success of his youth, which had already faded, and a rift began to grow between the two. In 2019, Lowtax would take a "business trip" to frick a 25 year old BPD slut for a month. He would leave his wife and child in the midwest, with no money or car, in the middle of the coldest time of year. When he returned, his house was empty, as Ashli had escaped to a woman's shelter with the help of Lowtax's first wife. Lowtax made an angry facebook post accusing his soon to be ex-wife of kidnapping their child, further drawing the ire from his community. His eldest daughter contacted him asking him what his problem was, with Lowtax telling his teenage daughter to go frick herself. This would be the last time they spoke.

The slut Lowtax hooked up with was a piece of LA BPD trash named Logan Day. She and Lowtax tried to claim repeatedly that their relationship was strictly professional, but the users of SA knew this was bullshit.

His patreon was bleeding about $1000 a month until he got down to about $7000. Later that year, in july, Logan would accuse Lowtax of hitting her in a strange Facebook post, and by that time, his community was done with him. His patreon collapsed in a matter of days, and he was left with only a couple hundred a month. With mounting legal depth and no more future income, Lowtax had to make a very painful decision. Below is a picture of his patreon:

In late 2020, Lowtax would sell the site to some twink named Jeffrey of YOSPOS, who was supposedly a crypto millionaire. He got about 400,000 for the site, a bit less than the 14 million he was offered earlier in 2007. Jeffrey would then auction the right to ban Lowtax to a lucky user, and Lowtax, shortly after selling the site, would be banned from his own forums, never to return.

At this point, Lowtax had almost no money, no income, and was in a legal dispute that was costing him thousands. He had lost most of his friends and his family. It was now 2021, and Lowtax was 45 years old with no assets, skills, and with poor health. He turned to doing streams on gaming garbage, his dogshit youtube channel, which would only attract around 12 or so viewers, and he would show up on stream fricked up and incoherent. He did streams where he would eat meat sticks for money, barely making more than a couple hundred at most.

Below was his last stream, Nov 6th, 2021

On November 7th, 2021, the judge in Lowtax's court case against his ex decided the following:

-Lowtax had deliberately spent the 400,000 in 14 months in order to not pay it to Ashli

-Lowtax had physically, emotionally and verbally abused Ashli

-Lowtax had failed to pay the Guardian ad Litem (this is sometimes required in a custody battle, where the child has to essentially be cared for by the court. The guardian ad litem in this case was named Dana Outlaw, which is a cool name)

-Lowtax told Ashli ahead of time that he was going to move Logan in to the house and expected her to "be OK with that."

-Lowtax was ordered to pay Ashli a lump sum of $92,000 (which had been seized by restraining order so Lowtax couldn't spend that too)

-Lowtax was also ordered to pay Ashli $6,500 a month in spousal support for 2.5 years

Two days later, on November 9th, 2021, Lowtax would shoot himself.

His death was announced to the users at SA by Kevin "Fragmaster" Bowen, a longtime admin and best friend of Lowtax. His forum mostly dunked on him, and he is remembered for being a colossal piece of shit who stumbled into greatness and squandered it all away.

His family was left with basically nothing. He blew everything on games, luxury $70 pies on goldbelly.com (which is like etsy for baked goods) and rented sports cars. He also spent tens of thousands on mobile games. He also rented his house and had no assets other than something awful, which he had already squandered the proceeds of.

These days, most people don't know who Lowtax is. The only people who currently discuss him are on kiwifarms, and its just to sneed at how much of a piece of shit he was. He really was, too. He left three children and two mothers without a father, and was buried by his mother who was dying of leukemia, and passed away about 4 months after Lowtax did. His oldest daughter Lauren was especially haunted by his death.

He was once seen as a figurehead of internet culture back when it was niche, and nerdy, and kind of a counterculture.

SA is now a dead mall of the internet, with a front page that hasn't been updated in three years.

If you've made it this far, thank you so much for reading this. Today is the 2nd anniversary of Lowtax's death and I wanted to say that I love this site (rdrama) because it reminds me of the spirit of early Something Awful.

The Marvels embargo finally lifted, so it's time for another BOT harvest There were two embargos, first a social media one (random fanboys who are always as positive as possible) and the actual critics one that lifted a day after. This part is about social media reviews since the post was too big, I'll comb through the rest of the thread in a few hours.

:

There are some reviews on letterboxd. Most people are surprised by how much they liked it

This was before the social media embargo fully lifted and people were still optimistic here

This adds a new wrinkle onto the ongoing meltdown situation. Maybe we can expect good legs from the positive reception. Unless they're fake.

They're all from me. I have so many emails right now. 😬

Marvel shill number three, notice the smugness.

Idk what lettrboxd does for curation, if any, but it does seem more credible than say IMDB which is basically a madhouse

Since our friend Zatt has stopped posting after complaining about my 'hit piece', we are left with this guy as the main Marvel shill, and a small army of second hand soyshitters like the guy above

Really want the reviews to be positive for Brie and Nia. Especially Brie coz that poor woman needs to be validated after the last 5 years of absolute shit that IncelTube has given her.

She doesn't deserve “validation” if she turned in another dull as dishwater performance though. Why do we just ignore that the first was massively successful for reasons that really had nothing to do with her? She already has gotten insanely lucky in reality with this franchise (the Internet is not reality). I'm just tired of the narrative that the toxic online discourse pertains to the GA at large. The vast majority of people who saw the first and are rejecting this one are doing so for reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with the toxic online backlash.

Even BOT is smelling the blood in the water at this point

I equally don't think anyone should feel sorry for DaCosta. She chose to go into the MCU machine for a paycheck, despite numerous examples of "movie making by execs, not by directors". She could have walked at any point over "creative differences". She seems quite content with this assignment strictly for the money. I still don't think the reviews will be terrible, more middling, and the floppage will be attributed to overall brand fatigue, strikes, etc. DaCosta will be available fine in any case.

(simp nr. 1. I feel like it would be pretty darn hard for an up and coming young female ethnic minority director to just say “no” point blank to an opportunity like MCU. She could have gotten herself in hot water for getting future good opps turning down something like that as a relative “nobody”. So I'm willing to cut her more slack, even if she did go in knowing she was just a part of a machine and wouldn't have much creative control. Or even if she did have much creative control and is the reason the movie might not be very good.

(simp nr. 2. (also ) Do you realize how hard it would be to pass on a chance to direct an MCU movie? Up until now it was a pretty safe bet. Even if you won't do another one, an MCU movie will put your name out there and if the movie is successful (like the vast majority of MCU movies) then it will open a lot of doors for you. So I think saying "she chose this" is pretty harsh. Also, she couldn't walk away "at any point". You might think you're on the same page with everyone but things can change during filming and post-production. Now she'll be forever connected to the worst bomb in the most successful movie franchise.

No, black women have no agency and can't be criticised ever

I really don't see many doors opening for up-and-comers that do these sorts of movies. It's usually directors that have other credits or well-developed upcoming projects that come out alright. The proper inexperienced ones end up chewed out and spat out, whether it's Marvel, DC, Star Wars or whatever. It's very much a financial decision and - like any adult that chooses to invest in something or take a job - it's 100% on her. You're making it sound like she was strong-armed or something. Give me a break. She'll be fine anyway but this handwringing is over the top even if she did get thrown under the bus. You can't be all "yas queen, I love you, you're so strong and powerful" and at the same time "oh no, poor woman HAD to say yes or she'd be blacklisted".

I think people saw that one quote from DaCosta where she said "this is a Kevin Feige production" and took it as something much bigger than it actually was. She's also said multiple times that she felt she had a lot of freedom in the production, and that she felt they were very supportive of her vision. The Narrative that this is "movie making by execs" is basically just a fan theory.

This guy accidentally threw DaCosta under the bus in his haste to defend Papa Feige

I noticed TV shows never get as many IMDB ratings as Movies. Makes me think movies always get more wider audiences then tv shows.

Yeah, no shit

Me, logging on for the first time today. ”I wonder how the forum is doing. Oh, there's 60+ new comments in ‘The Marvels' thread. How fun, I'm sure none of these are ridiculous, redundant or off topic!”

Well I wasn't necessarily thinking about box office so much as how much people were into those characters. I feel like nobody liked Thor until Ragnarök.

Now he's throwing former Marvel movies under the bus in desperation

(some critic) "You best get yourself some tickets before the social media embargo lifts at 12am est and there's a rush"

I smell sweet victory.

it's coming. vindication

Oh, it's coming all right

This is completely unexpected, she's been hating this movie on her channel since day one

If you aren't familiar with Graces channel: she was absolutely not biased towards this movie in any of her coverage.

Come on let's not get our hopes up because of Grace Fing Randolph and a cryptic tweet.

When even other Marvel fans are telling you to calm down

Well all we have to go by are these responses, and so far theyve been positive. Including one from someone who's consistently been on the same track as critics saying it's good, and someone who's been very, very, very negative about the movie leading up to now indicating she liked it a lot as well. Obviously a small sample size, and could easily swing the other way, but this is what we have so far.

(some other 'critic') We just saw #TheMarvels - full review tomorrow, but it's one of the most surprising movies of the year, bringing fresh air to the MCU, as well as some jaw dropping moments that will have audiences screaming. Don't sleep on this movie! - Connor Webber/Attractions Magazine

This just keeps happening. It's not Just Grace. It's all over the place. And, idk why you say grace wasn't hating on the movie. I'm a big Grace Randolph enjoyer, and I've kept up with everything she's said about The Marvels. She is mostly critical. Been throwing doubt on it for a while now.

And this is the point where the social media embargo lifted.

alright. Time to rewatch Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel, and WandaVision.

Even as a potential joke this is

Okay. Honest opinion time: #TheMarvels is a great movie. You don't even notice that it's only 105 minutes long. Nia did an amazing job. The fight scenes are literally out of this world. Choreography on point!! And the end credits scene… I screamed. Go watch it. I'm serious

NO CAP…Tain, 😏 the #TheMarvels isn't the train wreck the media has been pushing it to be. Sure, the story can be uneven at times & the villain isn't memorable but #MsMarvel and #MonicaRambeau carried this film and also made #CaptainMarvel a more interesting. This is better

The Marvels reviews are pouring in on Letterbox and they're phenomenal make sure you get your tickets for #TheMarvels while you still have a chance #CaptainMarvel #MsMarvel

Lemme hear y'all haters now lmaooo #themarvels in Theaters this FRIDAY!

I'm glad other fans enjoyed #TheMarvels as well. I hope people gave it a chance before hating on it for no reasons. Easy top 5 mcu film! Anyways, I'm on my way to watch it for the 2nd time w/ family. Go get your tickets now! I'm dead serious.

#TheMarvels    is a solidly fun and entertaining time at the movies. The chemistry between Carol, Monica and Kamala is the best dynamic of the movie. There are some inventive action sequences and Iman Vellani steals the show. That ending and mid credit scene are 🤯

I'm happy to report #TheMarvels is really good!! Iman Vellani is sooo much fun as Kamala Khan she absolutely kills the role even more then she did before. Brie Larson actually get much more to do this time around and show off her vast range of acting abilities! The runtime is perfectly fine to go along with Nia DaCosta's directing everyone involved did a tremendous job. AND OMG THAT POST CREDIT SCENE!!!! #TheMarvels #Marvel #MCU

Just watched #TheMarvels, and it was an absolute BLAST thanks to an unbeatable trio and flerken fun! Oh, and that mid-credit scene!! 😳MarvelStudios Alright, #THEMARVELS is fantastic, Nia DaCosta needs all the praise. The story is heartwarming, but just in general, this movie is so darn good. Review for houstonstyle soon come 🫡

I am still not seeing any negativity. Just going through the Hashtag

These are all randos on twitter and this guy is already creaming himself (I didn't wanted to include the actual reviews at first but the longer it got the funnier it become) He keeps going on by the way

I'd be immensely surprised if this ends up fresh, especially since no big critics even weighed in yet. We'll see!

Cause big critics respect embargos lol. These dudes are desperate

As always I will wait for the actual reviews with Marvel/comic book movies in general.

BvS flashbacks

The veterans are already circling

posts some more reviews

First one is ironic

Almost all of these are random people and the F-word [fantastic] is used by all of them. Yeah, I'm waiting for actual critic reactions before making judgment. They should be up in 40 or so minutes from now.

40 minutes, some people are breaking the embargo

We're getting closer

are we getting psy-oped?

Yes

"#TheMarvels is a fusion of light, color, and sound. Action scenes are accentuated with rumbling bass if the theater is so-equipped. DO NOT LEAVE BEFORE THE CREDITS END, make sure to stay seated and appreciate everyone who made the movie."

one of the weirdest reviews i've ever read seems like everyone decided to put on their kid gloves tonight

What's weird about it? Sounds like it was a beautiful visually stunning experience for them.

Stunning and brave

Reading a few of them, they seem pretty lukewarm. Ouch. At least they're not as bad as Quantumania I guess. It'll probably end up in the Love and Thunder range. Which is basically a kiss of death in today's landscape.

Honestly, didn't read the actual critics yet but reaction from these influencers etc (that counts for RT anyway) are actually pretty good. I didn't find that sense of blase that was all over Quantumania reactions at least until now. And it seems like the “expecting nothing” vibe kinda help it, lots of people saying they expect something bad and get a very entertaining thing

I'm not seeing where the sense of a 70-79 (RT score) is coming from. I'm still only seeing positive. Even the person. Who said it was "objectively trash" said they liked it. (Personally I hate when people call something they like "objectively bad". It's dumb)

Didn't people immediately start talking about how bad Love and Thunder was? This sounds like a decent film that just about everyone enjoys. To get in the 70s on RT, you have to make a sizable portion of the audience not enjoy the film

I wouldn't say lukewarm. Quantumania was for sure lukewarm. The Marvels is more "its surprisingly fun" and reactions seems to be skewing positive. Let's see how other people reacted once more tweets start to pop up.

A disappointing opening seems like foregone conclusion at this point but if reviews/WOM are positive then there's no reason why it can't find staying power over the holidays, especially when it's going to be around until mid-December looking at the schedule and this being one of the lightest holiday slates in (2020 aside) years with no Star Wars/Spider-Man/Avatar-style titans anywhere in sight.

Yeah these reactions are basically " went in with low expectations, but found it enjoyable ,not top tier marvel or anything". Thinking 60s RT . Villian is meh and plot is meb but fun. It's middle of the road MCU is what I'm getting.

Sounds like Love and Thunder. Heck these reactions are less enthusiastic than they were for L & T

Aaaand hope effectively ended

idk people on reddit are doomposting and expecting a rotten score...Maybe we are missing something? A fresh score may not be a given

Idk if it's been posted here yet but they're saying audience scores in Korea are lower than Ant Man 3

2.5⭐- Hong Kong

LMAO

I don't doubt this but given South Korea's issues of misogyny, hard to take at face value

Fitting comment for a guy with a Will Smith avatar

Captain Marvel got a 91% on CGV while Black Widow has a 96%.

No, South Korea is just as misogynistic as the arabs

Honestly? Feels like Thor 4. There are people genuinely loving it, but a considerable amount that thinks is a mess but not a complete disaster. Yeah, i think it'll be fresh on RT even if barely and in it's 50's in MC. I mean, it could be worse, really don't know why Marvel treat it like some Fantastic Four (2016)

This is feeling like a 60s or 70s. Not enough to really move the needle. Giving me Flash reviews vibes honestly.

Personally I feel like I'm interpreting higher levels of positivity. Like this review using language like "expertly" feels really strong to me. Or this one calling it a "breath of fresh air" implying it's better than recent MCU films

To be fair to BOT users, they are slowly adjusting their opinions as more reviews drop, aside from the newest Marvel champion of course.

Also an interesting thing i noticed: female posts seems more happy than the male ones

SHOCKING 🤗

To bad women aren't actually watching the film then

"Really dug #TheMarvels. Not perfect, but a breezy 1 hr & 45 full of laughs (courtesy of Kamala + her fam) and clever action sequences boosted by the film's body swapping. Iman Vellani is the MVP. The film does an excellent job setting Ms. Marvel up as the MCU's next leader."

That's actually wild, all this Ms marvel love considering people in here were just talking about how nobody cares about her

Within the last few years Ms.Marvel will have been the star of: A massive failure of an Avengers game that bombed, The least watched MCU show, And now what looks to be the biggest bomb of the MCU

Truly the leader Marvel deserves from here on, I hope they keep her

Putting this on Ms. Marvel is ridiculous when she was barely featured in those trailers.

Yeah, it's probably a coincidence that everything else involving her bombed

This is just not true unless you stopped paying attention after 1 single trailer. Other than that original E3 trailer she is featured heavily in the trailers

Ms. Marvel was the least of that game's problems and you know it. What was even the point of bringing it up.

What's the point of a poster lying about Ms. Marvel being featured in trailers and you giving it a thumbs up? https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/10/22/why-kamala-khan-was-chosen-for-marvels-avengers-protagonist-role It was well known she was the main character. I can post lots of trailers and articles easily disproving that lie. She was the lead character of a game that lost the publisher over $100M. She had her own TV show that barely anyone watched. And now she's a co-lead of what is going to be a bomb. At a certain point you have to call a spade a spade. People aren't interested in the character in a mainstream sense. It is what it is. If Marvel wants to keep pushing the character that's fine but it'll likely result in people tuning out, as evidenced by a game, a TV show and now a movie. I was merely listing examples to back this up, nothing more, nothing less.

Franky I'm surprised to hear the game bombed, someone on reddit told me it was a huge success and one of the best Marvel games out there, whatever that means

The E3 trailer that pretty much everyone blames for killing interest in the game? Come on dude, you know what you're doing.

And what am I doing?

An obvious dogwhistle which you're not very good at masking.

Yeah no need to continue this conversation when you need to jump to pathetic things like that accusation because some comic book media you like got criticized. You lied, I called you out on it and now you resort to that. Sad stuff.

There's literally no reason why you'd bring up a game she was far from the main focus of in the marketing as the 'reason it failed' unless you had an ulterior motive. If you've paid attention to my posts, at all, I've been far from defending the MCU. You're just being pathetically petulant because someone refused to humor you.

You're arguing in bad faith!

"I went in hoping it wouldn't be TOO bad"

"It's not for everyone but low expectations can help"

Banger quotes.

RED FLAG

Overall it definitely seems like the movie is definitely not the unwatchable wreck so many anticipated.

some critic posted a rotten review despite the critic embargo still being up

STOP THE COUNT

This is the 'banger quotes' guy and he's been pooping on the movie from the first pages of the thread.

After reading some reactions from some reactor channels I know, I'm thinking this gets a Rotten Tomato. They're saying they wished they had taken the free alcohol option during their screenings. Shit, I wouldn't be surprised if this goes below Morbius at this point.

Wait…the free alcohol in that other post wasn't a joke?

“The film was fine. Everything about it was terrrible” God I'd love to grift as a reaction junkie.

Don't let your dreams be dreams

Still early but The Marvels has a 3.3 on Letterboxd right now which isn't a great starting score for it.

But posted some screenshots of 9 and 10 letterbox reviews earlier in the thread, are you telling me they were all just paid shills?

I don't take anything from that because the general public largely has not seen this movie.

Letterboxd is international and it's out internationally. Going by the numbers, that lines up.

Rekt

To be honest these reactions are actually more positive overall than I recall the Captain Marvel ones being, which were a lot more muted. Though of course there are times where the actual reviews have a very different take than the early reactions, but so far the consensus is a fun but kinda messy in some parts romp.

At this point they're even throwing Captain Marvel under the bus

That right there is a problem. If a frickin family is the best thing about a SH movie than wires crossed somewhere. It should be dynamic between SHs or SH and the villain not some side family or cats unless cats are the protagonists. Anyway, main takeaway, reactions are standard bland passing grade gibberish (lots of fun, lots of heart, I went in with low expectations but was pleasently surprised, please stay for post credits cause they make the whole thing important, most hyperventilating character is the MVP, script problems and weak villain but charm did I tell you about charm). Nothing new. All the buzzwords that mean the movie's totally mid without saying it's totally mid.

At least they aren't saying the movie is boring.

yeah nothing is more darning than boring. And at only 105 min it really would need a miracle to be.

This guy is a and he's duking is out with the best of them

Kamala has a strong fan base but thats not translated into viewers.

Yeah, twitter 'nerds' who would never be caught dead buying an actual comic book

Social media reactions are just terrible to me. Remain unconvinced they drive anything towards the film

I don't think the arguments ever been that social media reactions drive tickets, it's that they're a strong bellwether to the films reviews, and those do drive tickets.

Good reactions and reviews are not and won't be any suprise. Just like with the first one.

Good reviews would have been a miracle at this point...

they didn't really do a good job forcing that phrase/tag line. It's so awkward while “Wakanda forever” feels so much more smooth.

Yeah I don't think the tagline caught on at all.

Tagline is Higher. Faster. Further. Together. And it's not true that it never caught on, it caught on very well on the boxoffice subbredit who has been very busy mocking it to heck and back for the past few weeks

The overwhelming consensus so far seems to be "fun but flawed": not as great as Guardians, but not Quantumania. It sounds like a lot of people went in expecting something awful but ended up having a good time.

He just keeps repeating the same thing over and over, who knows maybe it will come true eventually?

So many “it sucks but thumbs up reactions”

Can't wait to see them put the"it's terrible but it works" quote in the "accolades" tv spot.

Seems a lot of folks want to treat Disney/Marvel with the cushiest pair of kid gloves they can find.

As usual, critics are protecting Disney movies as much as they can

French reviews are horrible, 2.6/5 on Allocine and still early so it can drop and match Quantumania's 2.3/5. French audience reception also horrible, similar to a C cinemascore. Korean audience reception horrible and worse than Quantumania

Not that this will save the movie

For context, a C cinemascore would be truly disastrous, and I don't think any Marvel movie managed that. For a blockbuster anything below a -A is bad.

I don't think the idea of "Marvel Bias" holds up after Eternals, Quantumania, and Secret Invasion. I think it's just Occam's razor; the reason they say the movie is enjoyable but messy in parts is because...that's how they feel about the movie. Maybe you could make the case that the negative coverage lowered expectations going in, but there's a clear consensus across these reactions.

No, critics were never overly kind towards the Mouse, all those stellar reviews were fully earned

2 negative reviews on RT now.

You'd think Disney would be powerful enough to hold some of these reviews back until the embargo lifts... Also why is RT allowing this before the embargo lmao

I mean it lifts in half an hour, it's not that ridiculous a few got in early.

So many comments and only 10 minutes passed

Does it? By my count we're still 3.5 hours away from reviews dropping (9 AM PT).

Some might actually be on drugs already, or just drunk

Oh SHOOT, i forgot i'm in a different timezone... I really thought we had a few hours left...

There are no brakes on The Marvels train

My bad, I misread it as 9 est and not 9 Pt

You were correct, actually. Embargo lifts 9AM PT/12PM ET)

Plot twist!

I know people on here were clearly rooting for a Morbius type routing, but based on these reactions so far that just doesn't seem likely. It's more middle of the road to generally positive.

I don't think any reasonable person expected Morbius level reviews (one of the worst-reviewd comic book movies ever). But it will still likely end up rotten.

Hey Guys :) I am new hear as a member. Silently reading along for a while now. I just decided to contribute here. So I am from Germany and the reviews for the Marvels are pretty good. Like not masterpiece good but good. I checked newspapers and youtube reviewers and 95% of them gave a score that would translate into a fresh score at rotten tomatos. I know they won't contribute to that score, germans do not post on RT but to my surprise most people like it here. Will it help overcome the terrible presales here in germany ? Maybe not but it seems interesting to me. France for instance killing this movie 😵

Further proof that krauts aren't human

Get ready, this will be one for the ages. John Carter's record as the biggest bomb of all time may, after eleven years, finally go down.

I think John Carter was unofficially dethroned by the latest Indiana Jones and even The Marvels will struggle to go lower than that, since Indy had a huge budget. Notice how the biggest flops ever are all Disney movies...

“a ton of fun and I can't wait to see it again!”

……………. 7/10

yup, we're in for one of those RT runs.

Gotta give it a fresh review to keep the woke credits!

Can't get over that “just go in with low expectations!” Tweet

I can't get over that “they gave us alcohol” Tweet

4th review on RT, ant the 3rd rotten one

RELEASE THE HOUNDS!

At this point we can consider the critics embargo lifted, it's not like they care about it

someone started the 'Ms Marvel was never a successful character' discussion again

Iman Vellani wasn't even involved with the game...? A lot of people fully taking their masks off right now. Yikes.

Yikesorino!

The stans overreacting and declaring victory based on the first flood of reactions from the Funko accounts was the climax this thread needed and deserved.

Back when the hope was still fresh and feelings could still be validated

I think this is like Major getting a lot of praise for Ant Man. Its just the only nice thing they have to say about the film.

Not really though. It's just the most common one across everything, but the general reception, so far, is that it's a messy fun romp.

Should be interesting if messy fun romp ends up around the lower 40s or higher 60s on RT. Will critics be generous with their scores?

Well I can only go off of what I've seen so far, not hypothetical ones, but from what I've seen the critics that usually follow the bellwether of critical consensus are mostly positive.

He says this while there are 4 rotten revies and a single positive one

Paris numbers are lower then morbius

I'm sure whatever's about to happen in the next five minutes on this board will be met by a totally reasonable response and not a bunch of trolling bullshit.

It's like watching the countdown at a New Year party

It's time

Critics embargo officially lifted

There are nearly 30 pages left past this point, so you know they've been busy. Tune in for the next episode

Also, Aevann I broke the character limit again, had to break my post in multiple parts when I reached a 49.996 count

Greetings Dramatards

I have to do a contours job this Monday, and i told boss I know how from the Software course I took earlier this year, but it's been 7 months and I forgot everything. I'm screwed!! Hopefully this weekend I'll be able to study the notes I took during the course and remember how the frick to do the stuff

Right, anyways, we all know our favorite nation of crocodile fondlers and kangaroo molesters , and how their particular brand of slang and accent had developed uniquely in isolation from the rest of the Anglosphere. And how they famously refer to strangers as Mate, to the same degree of informality, as Nippon Jappoids add sama/san as honorifics for formality.

If you wanna make a poor low-effort impression of australians, then most fools just plaster Mate every other sentence despite australians not using the word THAT often. Despite only being a population of 25 million, they are vastly more famous in their collective steriotypes than nations of proportionally larger people, mostly due to shitty cartoons and comedy imitations.

Well one unique interaction between Australians and South Africa tends to occur semi-frequently due to the word Mate, which is often expressed in blissed ignorance

MATE IN SEF EFRICA:

In South Africa, in the Afrikaner language, Mate, as said by Australians has an ALLLLLL TOGETHER different meaning.

Though not pronounced exactly the same, phonetically it is very similar to the 2nd most infamous afrikaans racial slur: MYT!

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/meid#Afrikaans

Pronounced with a hard "T", the word meid is usually easily distinguishable from maids in English, but with Mate in an Australian accent, sometimes an aussie foreigner can find himself in hot water!

https://dsae.co.za/entry/meid/e04677

Myt/meid enjoys the same status status of vulgarity and offensiveness as Kaffir, the afrikaans equivalent to the Burgerland "BIPOC".

Myt can roughly be translated as "Nigress" to understand its vulgarity, though it was often used by the dutch/proto-afrikaans to refer to maidservants - though as the centuries assed, and servants, especially those of the black and coloured race tended to do the most impoverished jobs like maids, gardeners, the cultural impact of the word morphed very weirdly to include coloured women and black women as well, even if they didn't occupy the role of a domestic servant at all. Eventually by the time 1950s Apartheid got its stranglehold into South Africa, Myt became a very widespread slur for black women especially, though it was often enough used to describe domestic servants and coloured women as well in context.

Curiously, it is important to know that white domestic servants, no matter how poor or low-status, were never referred to as a Myt/Meid by the time the term had fully transmorphed into a slur in the Afrikaans lexicon. Thus Myt/meid and even the English maid became a derogatory word. It's not like Afrikaners and black peeps could not

https://aforathlete.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_South_African_slang_words

SPELLING OF M##t:

Additionally lol, due to the offensive nature of the word, there had been no officially recorded consensus of its spelling. I've found different spellings in different "woordeboeke" or dictionaries (translated as literally word-books), as well as contradictory spellings fricking online.

For the vast majority of my lifespan it had been spelt by my elders as Myt, as well as spelled as Myt in our giant family bible which recorded my clan surname from the 1st r-slur who got kicked off of the wooden sailing vessels in the late 1600s for smuggling and literally swam to the Cape of Storms station in shark infested waters. The dutch/proto-boers had the habit of recording family trees in these massive 5-10kg giant bibles.

Yet in other official national dictionaries, like the H.A.T. (Handwoordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal / Hand dictionary of the Afrikaans language) which had been printed since 1965, the spelling I saw recorded as the more common Meid. Which is funny, as it is not spelled the manner in which it's pronounced: a hard sharp "T" at the end, and not the softer "D" as with the english word for Maid

https://af.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handwoordeboek_van_die_Afrikaanse_Taal

So either my region of boeroids are illiterate country bumpkins or there had been some dipshit professor thinking he was really cute with this stupid spelling.

======

https://www.quora.com/Is-the-Norwegian-writing-system-phonetic-To-what-extent-does-the-spelling-of-it-relate-to-the-pronunciation

I make note of this fact of the more common Meid spelling being different from how it's spoken out loud, because Afrikaans is largely a very phonetic language - meaning it is always spelled the manner in which it is written, similar to the scandinavian languages like Sweden and Norway, thus making Meid an aberration. This is in contrast to English which has a metric shitload of loanwords spelled directly from the languages it obtained from the 50 nations Bongland curbstomped throughout its colonial era, as well from french, which contains many silent sounds - meaning English can be much harder to learn to write for many, in comparison to speaking it, because many many many words are NOT written as they are commonly phonetically sounded.

REPLACEMENT OF MYT:

Here is some Sef-Efricans about the Myt slur:

https://old.reddit.com/r/askSouthAfrica/comments/15o2l8s/maid_domestic_worker_helper_what_is_the

" Yup. I grew up with that word, and it makes my skin crawl. Also, I don't have that type of relationship with my house helper. She is an absolute gem that I can trust to take care of an aspect of my life that I can focus on my job. She is more than just a 'maid' ""

Makes my skin crawl

"Same. Grew up with many of those slurs that make me shudder when I hear it now. Too bad I still have to visit Grandma now and then." Makes me shudder

https://old.reddit.com/r/askSouthAfrica/comments/15o2l8s/maid_domestic_worker_helper_what_is_the/jvuqbj6?context=8

Anyways they are right: in Boerland few refers to a maid as Maid, and instead it's Housekeeper, domestic servant or "Huishulp" (House-Help).

https://old.reddit.com/r/askSouthAfrica/comments/15o2l8s/maid_domestic_worker_helper_what_is_the/jvr44xa?context=8

Nowadays Myt as an insult and slur has gone a bit out of favour, mostly because all the really REALLY racist turbo boer boomers have died of old age, or are currently wilting away in their retirement homes . However in the most rural of backwaters, you'll still find old redneck tier boomers of boers slurring away at their farmhands behind their back, and if they are really old in front of them

Also, it's hilarious that many many many black peeps had adopted a heapload of afrikaans phrases in their vernacular due to the influence which dominancy of Afrikaners had over SA, including phrases which have no connotation with their etymology of their own language. Including phrases like "Voetsek" which means "go-away" often to dogs or pets, or "antie" - an older female authority figure. "Baas" for boss, "sosatie" kebab on a stick, and so on.

But most hilarious of all is the adoption of Afrikaans slurs in everyday use, including self-derisatory slurs like Myt and Kaffir. Often you will hear a 70 year old Sotho, Xhosa or Pedi shout Myt at an older black woman, his wife or female colleague in anger - not because he is deliberately racist, but because it's the most offensive word he knows!

Liberal boer women basically die of hart attacks when that happens

LEON SCHUSTER MOVIE (2004) MAKES FUN OF MATE VS MYT:

Leon Schuster is worth about 10 longposts himself, but in summary he is an extremely famous RSA prankster comedian movie maker, he has made himself infamous by using invisible cameras to capture people's reactions to offensive and absurdest situations - and then making movies about them. Although, in many situations Leon got the living heck beaten out of him by understandably upset people.

Sometimes his movies follow an overall narrative, with these live-caught pranks spliced in between, and sometimes the movie has a regular comedian narrative. In 2004, roughly 10 years after Democratization of RSA, and a long enough period of ANC mismanagement to set in, alongside the usual despair following those peeps who live in corrupt 3rd world heck holes, a large amount of South African whites started to moan to flee SA to richer pastures like Bongland or Australia, this year was noteworthy because in 1994 there had been widespread panic that whites would be slaughtered in masses when Mandela Madiba and the ANC got hold of power, and a large exodus of whites fled the country in 1994 like p%ssies.

Yet spectacularly in 1994..... nothing happened. Mandela famously preached tolerance and peace, and a bizarrely, shockingly peaceful transition of power occurred. Fast forward 10 years, and a second popular exodus of whites was being discussed, as this time it would not be the Panga knife coming down upon the necks of whites in retribution that people saw as their demise, but the economic collapse under ANC mismanagement, and the soaring of crime which brought whites to fear.

Leon Schuster would take opportunity of this sentiment, and make a movie regarding the exodus of people to australia, in his 2004 parody/prank movie "Oh Schuks I'm Gatvol!"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oh_Schuks..._I'm_Gatvol

The movie plot: After growing fed up with crime in South Africa, Schuks decides to move to Australia with his friend Alf. On the way to Kangarooland, Samoosa Woestyn, a Schuster version of Saddam Hussein, (ruler of fictional Afkaq, which parodies Iraq), hijacks the plane and comedy movie shenanigans follow. Spliced in the movie is common pranks which Leon Schuster had made with real people in South Africa, made as if the in-universe plane-passengers are watching on their on-flight movies.

The humor of Leon......is famously extremely crass. A lot of it is low brow potty jokes, much of which would make the worst movies of Adam Sandler or Ace Ventura look like 5-star platinum oscar winning high-brow shit in comparison.

Anyways, in one of his most very very very infamous movie scenes, which had been memed into oblivion by Afrikaans speakers and fans of Leon Schuster (usually high schoolers infatuated with potty jokes), including white and coloured afrikaans speakers: is one particular scene in which a coloured lady in the 2004 Leon Schuster movie, is confronted with an Australian man greeting all the South African passengers boarding the plane.

The joke is short and simple and pretty much only comprehensible by South Africans: a stereotypical Australian greeter (full-kitted with a broadrim hat with wine-corks to keep away flies from his face), and ever stereotypical accent, greets everyone boarding the plane with: "Good day, Mate!"

When it's the coloured lady's turn in the row, she basically explodes and

RANDOM M*T BONUS FACT:

The afrikaans word for mites (the insect), is also "Myt". And this developed independantly of the Myt slur, similar how the Booby bird obtained its name prior to the development of Boobies as slang for a woman's breasts.

That's all I got, GOOD NIGHT

@Carp

ani social announcement

More posts about it:

https://lemmy.ca/post/8810522

https://lemmy.ca/post/8810529

https://lemmy.ca/post/8802401

https://lemmy.ca/post/8802719

The drama:

Just fyi. You have [email protected] in this thread using his alt @[email protected] here. He is moderator on known p-do and Loli instance burgitt.moe and he has been very angry at us at Lemmy World for calling him out.

He now pretends that it is not his account even though CJO obviously stands for CookieJarObserver, he also speaks German and he is defending the person that is ‘totally not him'.

Pretty sure he is using at least one other account here to play stupid - Amillionnames. This user popped up around the same time CJO had his accounts banned and is always in the same threads. And now they are having conversations pretending they are not the same person.

Yes I am all over this thread with my alt (because I could not talk to him from my LW account since he is banned) but it all just clicked. He was in every thread that mentions LW talking shit with his alts which made me wonder why he would not give his main account so this could be reviewed.

Now we know.

https://burggit.moe/u/cookiejarobserver [click at your own risk]

Bye (LW admin who ran a holocaust against dramatards)

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4652975

And thus the Lemmy.world shitshow continues… (Alledged CookieJarObserver sockpuppet)

Just have a look at this user's history if you want to know why he got banned. Basically calling us antisemites and what not. His entire history is full of LW shit-talking on his new account. He even admitted “I have a personal problem with these buttholes” without actually revealing his main account.

https://lemmy.world/u/[email protected]

Edit: his main account is [email protected] and he is a mod on a p-do instance (LW admin who ran a holocaust against dramatards)

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4632569

Yeah i don't care about you banning me, im literally saying you and the other mods are insane, and you constantly following me just proves my point.

Frick off. [-5]

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4650328

Admins having a power trip on spez level constantly, making their instance into a walled garden, like reddit, being antisemitic and harass other instances admins.

They believe they own lemmy now because they got lucky and be labeled the “default instance” by most apps and got pushed by many.

They are just as insane as Lemmyml admins.

They damage lemmy as a whole, willingly, with this behavior.

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4632696

you are so much full of shit lol [-11]

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4632865

I posted this comment on ani.social and got banned from Lemmy.world:

Who even cares, frick those guys.

Lemmy.world revealed how far they have their heads jammed waaaaaay up their own buttholes when they released their new TOS and were patting themselves on the back about it. Then, in true Le Reddit fashion, anyone in the comments section who dared to question that decision was getting mass down voted by brainless sycophants. Lemmy.world got lucky by being the most visible and attracting the most users this past summer, but it doesn't make them inherently special, which they clearly now believe they are.

The Fediverse is a new opportunity for internet discussion to feel free and open again rather than confined by kowtowing to corporate interests. These instances defederating from ani.social is forewarning to any users with their heads up that they are just places to avoid anyway.

Now, regardless of whether you agree with my stance or not, or if for some reason you are offended by the frick word, is criticism of policy seriously an offense so egregious that it warrants a ban?

Of course it isn't.

And before somebody tries to cleverly point out “hurr durr you sound butthurt because you got banned from LW” that's not at all the point I am making here. I'm pointing out the sheer insecure pettiness of the administration at LW that they would get so bent out of shape from some criticism from a throwaway account that they would ban it on the spot.

Ask yourselves if you really want to make LW your home base, because I do not.

Edit: also lol at Antik, a LW admin, coming to this comments section on an alt account and arguing with people. Dozens of testy, sparring comments bordering on harassment. This is the exact immature behavior that I am calling out. He had to literally do nothing to get a win here, yet he deliberately chose to show his butt to everyone instead. []

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4634511

Ask yourselves if you really want to make LW your home base, because I do not.

That was sort of my thinking as well. I've been trying to get a clear answer for a ban that archived everything to show that they were just banned for criticism, and I haven't gotten a direct answer other than a claim that contradicts the evidence.

Purging an account, banning it, and then allowing them to sweep everything under the ban rug is a direct attack on the credibility of user accounts, and I can understand people not trusting a server with it when they do that, and it's even worse when those admins are capable of being charismatic so people are much less keen to question them.

That's something that abusive power mods on reddit did all the time. They tried to sweep everything under the ban rug, keep quiet about it and only give out vague reasons, and then just label the user a shithead when they inevitably then had to proceed to try to scale it up, which meant trying to attract more attention, which made people question them more, which just swept them up with the people that really deserved it, and it just became a vicious cycle.

The one big tell is that when somebody really deserves it, they don't really hide it, whereas when its much more questionable, they keep so quiet that you have to wonder whether the person in question killed anyone, which just adds to it.

You can see how their admins behave in this thread…

Uh, is @[email protected] really Antik and not just someone trying to supplant their identity by naming themselves [email protected]? That … just raises so many questions if so.

No CJO, it's me don't worry I posted from my main account too (LW admin who ran a holocaust against dramatards)

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4634511

Yes. Its a Lemmyworld admin with a lemmy.ee account behaving like a absolute outcast.

No its the same person definitely otherwise he wouldn't be following me after they banned me from .world

He is a absolutely fragile person and a creep following others around the fediverse.

https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/4652422

!dramatards !schizomaxxxers !pings @Dramamine @Ninjjer @89wc @nekobit @PalestinePhallUS @CURTIS discuss

All is well and the world is beautiful. A smile spreads on my face because I feel an incredible rush of love and joy. I'm so happy to be alive and I'm so grateful to be here. I'm stronger than my worst memories and brighter than the darkness.

I hope you've had an amazing weekend. I'd like to discuss an amazing case I discovered a few years ago. This is the story of Abigail and Brittany Hensel. They are twin sisters, which would be amazing enough, but they also happen to share one body. I think you'll find this story as mind-blowing as I did.

Abigail and Brittany Hensel are born

Patty (a nurse) and Mike (a carpenter) Hensel were a happy married couple living in Minnesota where the enjoyed the company of a close-knit community. Here, Patty and Mike had two happy and healthy children who had no problem integrating into the community.

In 1989, Patty discovered she was pregnant. The doctors told her she would be having a girl, and all scans of the child suggested that Patty would have a successful pregnancy and give birth to a healthy child. On March 7, 1990, Patty went into labor. First an arm emerged, and then a head, and then another arm… and then another head, and then another arm.

The doctors were stunned. This was not one baby! It was two that had fused into one! Two heads, three arms, two legs, and one torso. It was too strange to believe, even when your own two eyes were looking at it. What was going on?!

Conjoined twins

You've often heard them referred to as Siamese twins. Conjoined twins occur when two fetuses are joined in the uterus. This is an incredibly rare condition. In most cases, the fetus dies in the womb, resulting in a stillbirth, or the twins die within 24 hours of birth. To put things into perspective. Over half of all conjoined twin births are stillborn, and of those, a third will die within the first 24 hours. It is estimated that 70-95% of conjoined twins are female, and the reasons are not yet fully understood.

The most common form of conjoined twins is the Thoraco-omphalopagus twin. This occurs when the twins are joined at the upper torso. In this scenario, they typically share vital organs such as the lungs or the heart.

Chang and Eng Bunker, who were from Siam, Thailand, and gave birth to the term “Siamese twin", were Xiphopagus twins, joined at the xiphoid cage. In the modern day, such twins can usually be separated depending on the nature of the fusion.

The saddest case is perhaps the Thoracopagus twin. In such cases, the twins are joined by the upper chest and share a heart. If they are separated, one twin must be sacrificed. Without giving too many personal details, a close relative of mine in the medical industry once dealt with such a case, resulting in the death of one of the twins.

Abigail and Brittany were Dicephalic parapagus twins, which is an exceptionally rare condition. A study on such twins yielded interesting results, though it should be noted that it is EXTREMELY rare to have cases that survive until adulthood.

Parapagus twins lie side by side with venterolateral fusion. Most commonly; these twins are conjoined at the chest, with joined liver and diaphragm but separate respiratory and upper gastrointestinal tracts, two arms; two legs, and two complete spinal cords and vertebral columns, a single shared genitourinary system and lower gastrointestinal tract. All parapagus twins have one umbilicus and a conjoined diaphragm and liver. In this case, there was a single umbilical cord and a single shared pelvic region and abdomen, but two joined thoraxes having two complete vertebral columns, two hearts and two pairs of lungs, two arms and two legs.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3939174

Abigail and Brittany were healthy, all things considered, but the third arm was completely useless, so it was removed, leaving them almost completely symmetrical. In case you want to keep track, from top to bottom, they have:

• 2 heads

• 2 spines merging at the coccyx and joined at the thorax by sections of ribs

• 2 completely separate spinal cords

• 2 arms

• 1 broad ribcage

• 2 breasts

• 2 hearts

• 4 lungs with the medial lungs moderately fused

• 1 diaphragm

• 2 stomachs

• 2 gallbladders

• 1 liver

• 1 large intestine (one colon, rectum, and anus)

• 3 kidneys

• 1 set of reproductive organs

• 1 slightly broad pelvis

• 2 legs

It's bizarre to wrap your head around. They have two mouths and can eat separate meals that pass through separate stomachs but ultimately end up in the same large intestines. Imagine if one doesn't eat and the other does, but they need to poop. Imagine the sensation of pooping on a completely empty stomach.

They also have one set of reproductive organs, yet they are two separate individuals with separate brains. How does sensation work? Who feels what?

Abigail and Brittany live life

It was decided that the twins would not be separated, for it would be a massive surgery with an exceedingly low chance of survival. If the twins did survive, they would have a very low quality of life. So, they lived as the two-headed girls, and they were relatively shielded from prying eyes in their small town.

What must be remembered is that they are separate individuals, as distinct as you might be from your sibling. Nevertheless, they happen to share a body. They make this work and achieve amazing feats. They can write, type, cut apples, and pretty much do anything that you could - but once again you have to remember that they are two separate people - each with only one arm and leg. They are coordinating their movements to achieve daily tasks that you would with two hands and legs. Can you imagine the flawless coordination that's required to get through one day?

As they explain, when they type, they don't have to speak much. They just know what to write. They often complete each other's sentences, and they can even drive! They had to take the test twice, because they are two people, but each time it was a coordinated act between two separate individuals working together to steer and work the pedals. Incredible! They attended Bethel University where they have earned a degree in education. Furthermore, they have become teachers in their small town.

At first, the twins were very camera-shy and loathed it whenever they left their town and had strangers take photographs of them. Over the years, things have changed, and they have come out of their shells. They are more willing to interact with the world, although they do still hold back when it comes to sharing intimate details regarding how some aspects of their lives work.

They had a reality show for TLC in 2013 that offered a look into their lives and how they conquered daily tasks and lived as normal girls.

Abigal and Brittany escape inceldom

You would expect that with severe disability they would be plunged into a life of inceldom as men run away in disgust. That is not the case, and they have had several suitors. This is partially because they have genuinely interesting personalities. I quite enjoyed watching documentaries about them and interviews. It's incredible how normal they are.

https://old.reddit.com/r/BeAmazed/comments/130ncpd/conjoined_twins_britt_and_abby_are_now_married

They have dated, however, and in 2022 photos emerged of them in wedding dresses, suggesting that they had married. However, nothing is confirmed, and they have remained mum on their dating lives.

Conclusion

Love is so powerful. It can conquer the darkest demons and rescue the most wretched from their fallen state. I believe that we all have a chance at happiness, and I believe that we all matter, for we are all made in the image of God.

Another relatively short post. I'm currently working on a longer post that will fully detail the crucifixion of Jesus Christ along with a medical analysis of his death.

Oprah Winfrey

When blood flows, it feels right. My teeth are gritted as red rivers run down my legs. The pain is deep, sharp, and for a moment my mind is blank. Adrenaline courses through my body as the darkness reaches a peak. I'm consumed, possessed, hellbent on self-destruction. Slash. Gash. Drip. The anguish grows stronger, the darkness gets thicker, it feels like I'm drowning in dread. There is no saving me.

When it comes to daytime television, it's hard to do it bigger than Oprah. Although her long-running talk show came to an end in 2011, it still holds several records and is remembered as an influential show that forever shaped television.

Today, I'd like to discuss some of my favorite Oprah episodes. This will be a relatively short post, mostly because I want to play Spider-Man 2. I'd also like to know what your favorite Oprah episodes are. No, the Tom Cruise jumping on the couch episode doesn't make the cut. It's not entertaining at all.

Janet Jackson

In 2004, Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake performed together during the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show. The performance was a hit, gathering over 150 million viewers. The pair ended their performance with Rock Your Body. Timberlake sang the last line “gonna have you naked by the end of this song” and proceeded to pull off a section of her clothing, revealing Janet Jackson's brown nipple adorned with sun-shaped jewelry. She has relatively small areola and perky breasts for a 38-year-old.

There was immediate backlash. The FCC received half a million complaints. The controversy had a monumental impact on Janet's career, and many would argue that she never recovered.

Her appearance on Oprah comes after the incident. She makes many claims:

• the nipple reveal was a mistake, Justin was supposed to reveal her bra

• She received backlash, while Justin did not

• The backlash she received was because she is a Black woman

I disagree with everything she says. I think it was 100% on purpose and Justin and Janet planned it. What are the odds of a wardrobe malfunction synching up with song lyrics? Obviously orchestrated. She even dressed her nipple up for the event. It was appropriate that she received the bulk of the backlash because it is HER NIPPLE. If Justin pulled his peepee out then the focus would be on him.

Jessica Coleman

As a teen, Jessica found herself pregnant from her boyfriend Tom. She lived in a conservative home so she hid her pregnancy, as she was afraid of what her parents would say. One day, she gave birth to the child in the potty. She wrapped it in a bundle, and then went downstairs to have supper with her family. Following this, she returned to her room and stabbed her baby in the chest, killing it.

Oprah interviews this teen, and she pulls no punches. She demands that Jessica say what she did to her child. When Jessica claims the baby was stillborn, Oprah calls bullshit. It is chilling to watch.

Charla Nash

Travis the chimp was owned by Sandra and Jerome Herold. The chimp, raised by humans since birth, was a celebrity in its town, and it would regularly accompany Jerome as he went about his errands around town.

Jerome passed away in 2004, leaving Sandra with the chimp. Many people warned Sandra that Travis was getting older and that she would soon be unable to control a horny adult chimp, but she insisted that Travis was harmless. As Travis grew older, his behavior started to worsen, and he would sometimes not listen to Sandra. To help calm the chimp, he was given Xanax.

One day, Sandra and Charla Nash, who was her friend, were having trouble getting, Travis indoors. The chimp flew into a rage and attacked Charla, chewing and ripping her face off. She received life-threatening injuries and Travis could not be calmed until police arrived and shot the chimp. The 911 call is horrific.

Charla makes an appearance on the Oprah show where she dares to show her mutilated face to the world. I commend her bravery.

Jacqueline Saburido

Jacqueline Saburido, known to most as Jacqui, grew up poor in Venezuela. She was smart, however, and she studied engineering. In September 1999, she attended a friend's birthday party near Austin, Texas. On the way there, she was struck by Reginald Stephey, who was driving drunk.

The driver of Jacqui's car was killed. Jacqui was alive, but she was still stuck in the car as it caught alight. She sustained third-degree burns to over 60% of her body before she was rescued and airlifted to a hospital in Galveston, Texas.

Here, doctors worked as hard as they could to save Jacqui's life - and they did! But it came at a terrible price. She lost her fingers, ears, nose, lips, left eyelid, and she was rendered half-blind. She had to undergo over a hundred surgeries. Jacqui was given a second chance at life, but she faces many difficulties and lives in constant pain.

During her Oprah appearance, she discusses the hardships she endures. She also speaks about her resilience and how she manages to keep going given the circumstances. It's an inspirational video to watch.

CONCLUSION

Why was I born? To live in constant psychological pain with no escape? To be rejected by the world and hated by all that set their eyes on me?

I am disgusting and ugly, and my mind is worthless. The true evidence of my evilness is the fact that I haven't vanquished myself yet. Why don't I have the courage to take the plunge?! It would make the world a better place, and it would put an end to my suffering.

It gets so dark… so, so bloody. I can't resist. I'm left alone with puddles of red plasma, blunt razor blades, and bad memories. I'm not supposed to be here, I'm a broken cretin that needs to be slaughtered in the most violent way.

Sorry for the short, low-effort post. Tune in next time when I give a full biography of Holly Willoughby.

Justin, 37, Arizona

I'm not even going to try coming up with a total debts or anything. This guy is insane.

Personal Life/Career

• "I'm in logistics and I sell stuff online" timestamp

  • "What are you sellin online?"

    • "Whatever makes profit"

  • "Logistics" is door dashing/roadie full time

    • various gig work things

    • Minimum $1200 a week (sounds like pre-expenses?)

    • 7000-8000 a month for holiday season

  • 127'000 gross income last year

• Lives out of his car?

  • "I've settled into this lifestyle and I don't like it

  • living a nomad life for the last 3 years "sort of by choice"

• Regional Manager for a marketing firm but laid off December 2018

  • Since then he has been "focusing on [his] logistics"

• "I focus on my kids and myself"

  • 17 and 14

  • Kids are with their mom full time

  • Sees them often?

• Relationship failing sent him spiralling for 8 years?

• Was reselling full time on Amazon and bringing in money?

  • Live-in girlfriend wanted him to go back to a job

  • He caved to the pressure, got regional manager job at a marketing firm

  • 300k from Amazon reselling, salary for manager not mentioned

    • Later mentions the salary is $83'000

• Owned condo, bought 2009, rented it out when he moved in with his girlfriend?

  • Complicated situation where he rented out the condo to his ex who had the kids

  • $36'000 remaining on the condo somehow prevented him from renting elsewhere?

  • Signed over the condo to the ex and her new boyfriend? Basically gave it away, they took over the loan

    • "That was one of my first bad decisions"

• Got burnout last year, started going to the casino frequently

  • "was winning a lot of money" but was sending all back in

• Hasn't paid his taxes in two years

  • Filed in 2020 but the agi was all wrong?

• Moved to stay with his uncle in California for fresh start

  • Got in an accident?

  • "I was out of commission for a week"

  • Uncle is a gambler and they would go to casinos together?

  • Accident caused a fallout between them?

• Had a Mazda CX-5 but the belt broke and he drove 50 miles without the belt

  • "Catastrophic engine issues"

  • Could cover the repairs $3000

  • Then it broke down again afterwards with some new issue allegedly?

• Got a Nissan Sentra after the second issue with the CX-5 in August 2021 timestamp

  • renting his vehicle at $475 but that price includes any issues with it?

  • Averages 9000 miles a month in the car

• Has been thinking about going back to a regular job but thinks the transition would be difficult

• His job hunting timestamp

  • Applied to one recently but got rejected post-interview

Financials

• Had a car repo'd timestamp

  • Was providing a vehicle as a part of child support but couldn't pay that as well as his own when he lost the marketing job?

• Lives in Hotels when he has his kids? Usually weekends?

• Doesn't miss his monthly payments but does carry balances on some of his cards?

• Car rental details timestamp

  • 161 dollars overdue because he incurred a cleaning fee on the last one

  • 28 day cycle, has been doing it for a year

  • $350 a week on the bottom end

  • $484 a week on his current one

  • "On the bright side it's a tax write-off"

    • He hasn't paid taxes in years

• "I think I was hacked" timestamp

  • Some stuff on his report that he doesn't know anything about

  • He reported them?

  • Lost his wallet last year and never got physical cards becuase he has no physical address?

  • He did not cancel the cards he lost

  • 2 student loans and an auto loan from Miami Florida

    • Hasn't locked his credit?

      • He says he didn't think of it

• 7 things in collections

  • Can account for 4 of them but doesn't know about the other 3 timestamp

• Tried to deal with the student loans timestamp

  • Called University of Phoenix they told him to come in with his photo ID

  • Arizona has digital ID so he wasn't driving illegally despite not having a drivers license?

• Got an iPhone timestamp

  • One's business one's personal

• Further car explanations timestamp

  • Once the one car got repo'd he stopped making payments and he'd spray painted the car during a mental episode so it wasn't worth as much

    • Got sold 6 months ago?

  • Goes on for a while? Sounds like he had a melty over customer service chads and made terrible decisions? I didn't follow this

• Checking Account? timestamp

  • Just goes on forever, amazing.

Spending Pie chart timestamp

PART 1: INTRODUCING HELEN ADAMS KELLER

Most addictions are deeply tied to rituals. The cigarette smoker cannot easily transition to vaping because they're in love with the process of lighting up the cigarette. Similarly, once self-harm has been adopted as a coping mechanism, you learn to love the ritual behind it.

It begins with the emotional downturn. At first, it's as silent and soft as a curl of smoke but before long I'm plagued by bad memories - every rejection I've faced, every mean stare and nasty word that's come my way is vividly replayed in my mind and there's no stopping it. Eventually, it becomes too much to bear. The darkness fills me until I'm ready to burst, and I'm desperately aching for some way to release the pressure.

I keep the razors in a navy blue pottyries bag. I reach in and grab my razor along with an old t-shirt. I pull my pants down to get access to my meaty thigh. It was once an empty canvas but it is now crossed all over with scars. Nevertheless, if I search hard enough, I can find a blank spot.

I close my eyes, think of how worthless I am, and then swipe. Fast, forceful, ferocious. If the room is quiet enough, I can hear my skin rip. It doesn't hurt at all at first. All I see is fresh white meat. Then, seconds later, blood gushes forth like an ocean at high tide. It comes with a rush of pain that courses throughout my whole body and I love it because I deserve it. Other people hurt me, so why can't I hurt myself?

It's easy to mutilate yourself when you have no self-worth. And it's easy to have no self-worth when you have no evidence to the contrary. Women detest me because my character and appearance are revolting. I am friendless because I am a depraved monster and nobody should be expected to tolerate me, at least nobody with any self-respect.

Self-harm is a form of self-punishment and an attempt at self-annihilation. My scars express the pain unseen within, they are silent screams heard by nobody, evidence of my attempts at self-destruction. Why stop? It makes me feel better.

I hope you're all doing well today I'd like to discuss Helen Keller. You probably have heard of her, and have been privy to more than a few distasteful jokes about the woman. I wish to make you realize that she led an amazing and inspirational life, and there is a lot to be learned from her. I very much enjoyed researching Keller's life, and by criminy I hope you enjoy reading about her.

Once again, this is a long post, but I have tried to make it more digestible through the addition of multimedia and by breaking up the text into digestible sections. I did consider making it a two-parter, but I find that kind of thing to be overly indulgent tbh. Just create a singular piece of work and let it stand on its own. Let's begin.

The circumstances of Helen Keller's birth

Helen Adams Keller was born on June 27, 1880. At first glance, it would seem she had a charmed life for a woman in that era, and you would be correct. She lived in Alabama and she was the daughter of Captain Arthur H. Keller, who was a veteran of the Confederate army. She spent most of her early days in the massive Ivy Green homestead with her mother and her four siblings, as well as her servants.

Things started to go wrong when Keller was about 19 months old. It was discovered that she had contracted an illness that affected her stomach and brain. Doctors didn't know what it was, but the end result was that she rapidly lost her hearing and sight, rendering her deafblind. Contemporary doctors looking at the case suggest that Keller may have had a form of meningitis, though they obviously cannot make any definitive conclusions.

At this point, you're probably interested in finding out how Keller's wealthy family reacted to the news, and how the disability affected Keller's psychosocial development. However, we're going to have to pause the story for a moment. Why? Well, we need to discuss deafblindness and contextualize it within Keller's lifetime. I hope you don't mind because there will be a few of these digressions.

Deafblindness

Although it may seem obvious what deafblindness is, that's not the case. Individuals with the condition can have varying levels of sight loss and hearing loss. Consequently, the solutions they need to make like easier differ.

Society and science has come a long way when it comes to understanding deafblindness. Originally, it was believed that without sight or hearing, a child would not be able to learn any language. Consequently, they would become intellectually impaired, and this was inevitable.

The result of this is harrowing, to say the least. You see the consequences in Herzog's documentary which features one of the most disturbing video clips I've seen in my life. It mainly features a 22-year-old Down syndrome child named Vladimir who is also deafblind. Vladimir hasn't been taught language or to read or write. He has an entirely undeveloped psyche. He can't even walk. I can't image what his jumbled, undifferentiated experience of reality is with no means of labeling anything or making sense of his surroundings.

Fortunately, our understanding of deafblindness has advanced, in part thanks to Helen Keller. We now know that deafblind children can be taught language and that they have normal intellectual capacities that can be used to help humankind.

Helen Keller's terrible years

In books she has written, Keller has described what it felt like to lose her sight and hearing. She claims it was like being lost in a fog, and that soon enough she got used to the silence, though the whole situation was understandably distressing to her.

She developed a kind of “home language” that she signed on people's hands. By the time she was seven, she had about 60 words she used to label things around the house or to indicate that she was hungry, for example. She was also able to tell which family member was around her by the vibration of their footsteps. I'm sure most of you have a somewhat similar experience - when I was a child in my bedroom, I could tell who was walking in the passage by the sound of the footsteps.

During this time, her behavior became wild and erratic. She would spit and scream and kick and she became impossible to control. On some level, this is understandable. She had suddenly been thrust into a silent, dark world and she somehow had to inhabit it while functioning in the same realm as everyone else. It must have been an incredibly isolating, frustrating experience. Who wouldn't lash out at the universe?!

She was an unruly, recalcitrant child, but she was also very lucky that she had supportive parents who didn't give up. Many parents at the time would have chalked up her behavior to intellectual disability and shipped her off to a mental institution. Keller's parents were different, however. They used their wealth to search high and low for the best educators to help wrangle Keller and bring some order and stability to her life.

It wasn't easy to find someone willing to help. As previously stated, most people believed that deafblind children were a lost cause and that nothing could be done for them. Keller's parents had contacts in high places, including with an inventor you may be familiar with - Alexander Graham Bell.

Though he is primarily known for his work on the telephone, Bell also worked extensively with deaf children and was renowned in the field. He was an important voice who advocated for teaching deaf children lip reading and sign language from an early age. He also proved that with early intervention, deaf children could be taught to speak, allowing for greater integration into mainstream society.

In 1886, Keller's parents brought Keller to Bell who was instantly enamored of her. Bell recognized that Keller was intelligent, as she had managed to create her home signs on her own. He couldn't help Keller, as he didn't have experience with deafblind children, but he knew an institution where she would get the help she needed. It was the Perkins Institute for the Blind, and it was there that Keller would meet Anne Sullivan.

All about Anne Sullivan

Born in 1866, Anne Sullivan (called Annie by her friends) contracted trachoma when she was about 5 years old. This left her partially blind, making it difficult for her to write and read. After her mother died, she was sent to a Tewksbury almshouse. The institution deserves an article of its own, as it was found that there were cases of r*pe and cannibalism going on. Needless to say, Sullivan did not enjoy her time here.

She was eventually sent to Perkins Institute for the Blind where she proved herself to be quite academically capable. She eventually graduated as valedictorian of her class. Much of her education came from Laura Bridgman, the first deafblind person to gain a significant education in the English language.

It was through her interactions with Laura that Anne learned that deafblindness was not an intellectual inhibitor, and that it was possible to educate deafblind children and, to some degree, adults. Sullivan became a teacher at Perkins and she learned to better her teaching techniques.

Eventually, she was asked to teach Keller when she came to Perkins. At first, she did not want to. She was aware of Keller's father who was a Confederate soldier, and she knew that their family used to be slave owners. Progressive for her time, Sullivan detested that. Nevertheless, she eventually put that aside for the sake of the child.

Helen Keller feels water

When Keller arrived at Perkins, she instantly disliked Sullivan. When Sullivan tried to hug her, she threw a tantrum and kicked and punched her. This did not deter Sullivan who quickly realized that Keller's parents were enabling Keller's tantrums. Thus, she asked that the child live with her for a while. Keller's parents accepted.

During Keller's first days with Sullivan, she was unruly. She would reach over and try to grab her food at the table, as she was used to doing at home. Unlike her parents, Sullivan slapped her hand away. This would enrage Keller who would then throw a fit on the floor. Unlike her parents, Sullivan did not pay any attention to her.

Soon enough, Keller learned that her tantrums weren't going to be rewarded, and her misbehavior was going to be stopped at every turn. More than that, she learned that it was far easier to be empathetic and pleasant to others. So she did that instead, and the monstrous Keller was gone.

Instead of raising heck, Keller absorbed herself in her studies. At first, it consisted of little more than Sullivan spelling out words on Keller's palm. Keller liked this, and she quickly learned dozens of three and four-letter words, though she did not know what they meant.

It would take a long time before Keller would eventually understand the concept behind words, labels, and language. You see, though she had created her home sign language, she hadn't yet conceived that it was possible to have complex thoughts about the world and to express these thoughts. She also did not yet know that everything had a name.

The breakthrough would occur after months of practice with Sullivan. The first word she tried to teach her was “water”. To do this, she would spell the word on her palm, and then run water on her hand. At first, Helen did not understand what Sullivan was doing. With enough repetition, it eventually clicked, and with that, a new world opened up to her. Writing on this moment, Keller states the following:

I stood still, my whole attention fixed upon the motions of her fingers. Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten—a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that w-a-t-e-r meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand. The living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, set it free!

To understand the importance of language in unlocking Keller's mind, a bit of linguistic theory is needed.

Linguistic theory regarding consciousness

The field of linguistics seeks to understand human speech and its role in our sense-making and differentiation of different elements of our consciousness.

The simplest explanation for language accepted today is that which is put forward by Saussure in Course in General Linguistics (1916). Within he states that communication occurs when an interlocuter has a concept in their head. They then use communally understood speech sounds to communicate the concept to their interlocuter who then can have the same concept in their head.

Stuart Hall proposes that two main systems of representation exist. The first is a system whereby components of reality are correlated with mental representations formed in our brains. Hall explains that mental representations can correlate with perceivable objects in reality such as a spoon or a playing card, or they can correlate with more abstract concepts. Such examples include rights, relationships, and goals which, although they do not physically exist, can be mentally represented. These mental processes consist “not of individual concepts, but of different ways of organizing, clustering, arranging and classifying concepts, and of establishing complex relations between them”, and without this, we “could not interpret the world meaningfully at all”. I hope you understand the larger implication here - no meaningful thinking is possible without some system of representation; you need an internal dialogue.

The second system of representation Hall mentions is language. Language is a complex system of representation composed of signs that “stand for or represent the concepts and the conceptual relations between them which we carry around in our heads”. Although language typically brings to mind a representational system that uses words as signs, Hall insists that language can also use visual images, colors, facial gestures, and other signs that aren't ‘linguistic' in any ordinary sense. Hence, language can employ signs that bear resemblance to the thing it is representing (as is the case with realism paintings) or it can forego resemblance, as one finds with written language where letters, words, and whole texts represent sounds and states of affairs without in the least bit resembling what they represent.

From this, it should be evident why language acquisition was so important to Helen's development, and why deafblind children were so horribly failed when they were not taught language. Everything Helen would go on to achieve, it was because Anne Sullivan took the time to give her the gift of language.

Helen Keller the student

Being blind and deaf should have ruined Keller's life. Through her indefatigable spirit, this did not occur. As soon as she understood the concept of language, she wanted to know the name of everything, and Sullivan was more than happy to teach her. The unruly monster was gone and in her place was an inquisitive, determined child who had a sureness to herself.

Keller soon learned how to read braille and it wasn't long before she was reading all the classics of the world, including Shakespeare. This helped her learn more about the world around her, and reading about politics and sociology let her know about the human civilization she inhabited. She read voraciously, educating herself until she was smarter than most adults.

Keller broke barriers once again when she learned how to speak at the age of nine. It was no easy task. You have to remember, she couldn't hear herself to regulate her voice, nor could she see how to form her lips. She used a method taught to her by Sullivan which had Keller putting her fingers on her interlocuter's throat, lips, and nose to feel the vibrations of their voice and the movement of their lips.

This is known as the Tadoma method. Through the Tadoma method, she could determine what her interlocuter was saying, and she could try to mimic the words. Though she made incredible progress, she was never able to speak completely clearly, and she always needed an interpreter.

Of course, teachers at Perkins noticed that Keller was positively prodigious, but they didn't want to make a big deal out of it. To them, Keller was just a child, and they wanted her to have as normal a life as possible despite the unusual circumstances she found herself in. Nevertheless, word eventually got out, and Keller became an international sensation at just ten years old.

This would be around the time she would begin her long career of achievements in multiple fields. Before we dive into that lengthy list, we'll begin with a failure she had at the very beginning. I bring this up to illustrate that life has speed bumps that will occasionally slow us down. Even people as great as Keller have to deal with them. It is how we respond to them that defines who we are.

Helen Keller the fraud

In contemporary times, conspiracy theories have arisen that Keller wasn't really deafblind and that the whole thing was a hoax. This is ridiculous, as her life and medical history are well documented. Nevertheless, there is one event that cast a dark mark on her legacy.

At the tender age of 11, Keller published her first book. It was a fantasy book titled The Frost King. It was well-received at first, with many marveling that a deafblind girl could write with such mastery of language at a young age. This praise soon turned to scorn when it was discovered that the text was heavily plagiarized from Margaret Canby's Frost Fairies. Keller denied this, but the evidence was far too darning.

Today, it is accepted that this was likely a case of cryptomnesia - Keller was a voracious reader, and she must have forgotten that she read Frost Fairies, and then incorporated the ideas into her own text. Nevertheless, Keller had a nervous breakdown over the incident, and it would take her a while before she gained the courage to write again.

With that out the way, we can now begin listing the amazing things that Keller managed to achieve in her lifetime. Count all the ways you are mogged by a deafblind woman born when women couldn't vote.

PART 2: THE MANY ACHIEVEMENTS OF HELEN KELLER

Helen Keller earns a degree

As you've probably sensed by now, Keller loved learning, so she didn't need any convincing to attend school. She shocked the academic world when she was accepted into The Cambridge School for Young Girls in Massachusetts. The elite school is for able-bodied individuals, and Keller managed to compete with them.

This wouldn't be the peak of her academic achievements. In 1900, she was accepted into Harvard University where she became the first deafblind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. She had proven the whole world wrong. Deafblind individuals were not stupid. They were not wastes. Instead, they were full of potential that could be unlocked through the power of language. I failed my English degree and proved the world right - I am worthless.

Helen Keller enjoys music

It would seem that music would be the one thing that would be impossible for a deafblind person to experience. This is not true. Not only could Keller conceptualize what music was, but she could also sense it by feeling the vibrations of musical instruments.

She had the opportunity to “listen” to the Zoellner Strong Quartet, and a newspaper from the time describes the event as follows:

A very interesting and beautiful experience of the Zoellner Quartet during their tour of America this past season was their meeting and playing for the wonderful deaf and blind girl, Helen Keller, and her teacher Mrs. Macy, while in Oklaohma City. Miss Keller was in that city on account of a lecture engagement. She could not see the players nor hear the music, but through her sense of touch and possibly some peculiar sense of feeling she 'could appreciate every shade of tone. As they played Helen Keller stood with finger tips laid lightly on the resonant wood of a table placed before her, apparently listening with bent head. She could not hear the notes, but the vibrations of the music were interpreted as appreciatively as though she possessed a trained sense of hearing.

"It is beautiful," she exclaimed softly as the music ceased. “You don't know how much I appreciateit.” "I feel the vibrations and the measured rhythm in music so I, too, can enjoy it even though I do not hear it." Miss Keller responded instantly to the music, swaying in rhythm and trembling while tears slowly gathered in the bright unseeing eyes or smiling joyously and breathing deeply with emotion. For hours the girl, who can neither see nor hear, sat silently enjoying the music or describing in her quaint way the scene or visions that each number called to her mind.

Mrs. Macy is mentioned. This is Anne Sullivan. In some records she is called Mrs. Macy, as she was married to John Macy.

https://web.archive.org/web/20131110155416/http://library.ndsu.edu/cowtools/dspace/load

Helen Keller escapes inceldom

Among the many false stereotypes placed on disabled individuals, there is also an enduring belief that they are asexual and do not have sexual needs. This is false, and Keller is proof of this. It has been recorded that Keller had a powerful s*x drive, though she could not express it, for Sullivan suppressed it with all her might.

Keller's s*x drive, according to Herrmann, was ''strong'' though diligently policed by Sullivan and her other guardians. ''Since my youth,'' Keller wrote in 1922, ''I have desired the love of a man''

https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/98/08/30/reviews/980830.30kendrit.html

I find it interesting that Keller knew that she specifically wanted a man despite never seeing one past 19 months old. One can understand why Sullivan was insistent that Keller remains a virgin. Firstly, she wanted to protect Keller's dignity. Secondly, if Keller fell pregnant, then what? She had no way of caring for a child. Unfortunately, the side effect of this is that Keller was rendered a femcel.

Not one to be defeated, Keller found a way to overcome her femceldom. She fell in love with a man named Peter Stragan. He loved her too, and he quickly learned fingerspelling so that he could communicate better with Keller. Sullivan and her family disapproved of the relationship that was budding, but Keller defied them.

Whether Stragan and Keller ever had s*x is up for debate. If it ever did happen, it was certainly in secrecy, so there would be no record of it. However, given Keller's tenacity, it would be odd to consider that she would choose to restrict herself and choose chastity when she has chosen to be more than what people try to make her in every other facet of her life.

Helen Keller the writer

Being a writer is one of the most romanticized professions, but very few who set out to become a master of the written language find a modicum of success. I discovered this the hard way.

Writing is one of the lowest-paying jobs in the world, and writers are consistently out-earned by garbage collectors and dishwashers. For every JK Rowling, thousands will spend years on works that will only make cents in royalties.

The average novelist earns $14,000 a year, and it is not uncommon for authors to go bankrupt to get their book onto the NY Times Bestseller (by buying their own texts, of course). Another fun fact - an English major is one of the most regretted majors, with over 50% of students regretting it. It is also one of the most rapidly shrinking departments in academia.

>in the U.S., the percentage of college degrees awarded in health sciences, medical sciences, natural sciences, and engineering has shot up. At Columbia University—one of a diminishing number of schools with a humanities-heavy core requirement—English majors fell from ten per cent to five per cent of graduates between 2002 and 2020, while the ranks of computer-science majors strengthened.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/03/06/the-end-of-the-english-major

Put simply, writing is a fool's pursuit and you would be wise to enjoy it as a hobby and nothing more. Well, unless you're as brilliant as Helen Keller. She loved reading and writing, and she was able to read in five languages. Though her experience with The Frost King had traumatized her, it wasn't enough to drive her away from writing completely.

In her lifetime, Keller wrote over a dozen books and was an international bestseller with her most popular text being her autobiography aptly titled The Story of My Life. Her books have since been analyzed by linguists who are deeply interested in her acquisition of language and how it influenced her perception of reality and the formation of her consciousness. She also wrote about many philosophical topics, including socialism and worker's rights. Her most notable works are:

• Optimism: an essay (1903)

• My Key of Life: Optimism (1904)

• The World I Live In (1908)

• The Miracle of Life (1909)

• The Song of the Stone Wall (1910)

• Out of the Dark (1913)

• Uncle Sam Is Calling (1917)

• My Religion (1927)

• Midstream: My Later Life (1929)

• We bereaved (1929)

• Peace at Eventide (1932)

• Helen Keller in Scotland (1933)

• Helen Keller's journal (1938)

• Let us have faith (1940)

• Teacher: Anne Sullivan Macy (1955)

• The Open Door (1957)

• The Faith of Helen Keller (1967)

• Helen Keller: Her Socialist Years, Writings, and Speeches (1967)

How many books have you written?

Helen Keller flies a plane

Determined to prove that deafblind individuals can do anything able-bodied folks can, Keller flew a goddam plane over the ocean. This took place in 1946, during a flight from Rome to Paris crossing over the Mediterranian Sea.

Of course, she was not able to do this on her own, and she had assistance from the pilot, but it was her in the pilot's seat commanding the plane. The event is described as such:

“by the same means as she piloted the 'plane, through hand ‘talk' between herself and [Thomson].” Thomson signed to Keller the pilot's instructions as, in the copilot's seat, Keller took over. “The 'plane crew were amazed at her sensitive touch on the controls,” Thomson said. “There was no shaking or vibration. She just sat there and flew the 'plane calmly and steadily.” As pilot, Keller felt “the delicate movement” of the airplane better than ever before.

https://www.britannica.com/story/how-did-helen-keller-fly-a-plane

Polly Thomson is one of Keller's caretakers. She played a more prominent role in her life as Sullivan grew ill and eventually passed away in 1936. Keller's aerial feat is so amazing that it sits at the center of many conspiracy theories claiming that Keller wasn't truly deafblind. Rest assured that the story is true and that other deafblind individuals have also flown planes.

Helen Keller meets everybody

During her lifetime, Helen Keller met with thirteen US presidents. This includes every president from Grover Cleveland to Lyndon Johnson. She was good friends with Mark Twain, and they would frequently write letters to each other.

The other famous people she met include:

• Charlie Chaplin

• Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes

• Eleanor Roosevelt

• Martha Graham

• Jawaharlal Nehru

• The Queen of England

• Winston Churchill

She also traveled to over 40 countries, and she took a liking to Japan. How many have you traveled to?

Helen Keller's accolades

Keller passed away in her sleep in 1968, after a few years of suffering strokes. During her lifetime and posthumously, she received the following awards (and many more):

• Presidential Medal of Freedom

• National Women's Hall of Fame

• Alabama Women's Hall of Fame

• TIME's 100 most important people of the 20th century

In 1956 she received an Oscar for the documentary based on her life. She was also inducted as an honorary member of the Stoney Nakoda Nation Native Indian Tribe.

Her birthplace has been declared a national landmark, and several streets are named after her in many countries around the world, including Switzerland and Italy.

Helen Keller the Eugenicist

Before we conclude, I have to discuss one unfortunate aspect of Keller's legacy. Despite being deafblind, Keller was extremely politically active. She was an ardent socialist, and she gave many speeches advocating for unions and worker's rights. Although it is seldom mentioned in the modern day, Keller was also an ardent eugenicist.

There is no sugar-coating it. She advocated for the culling of disabled children. In 1915, a physician caught the attention of the public when he refused to operate on a deformed baby which then died. In several newspapers, Keller argued in support of the physician. In her own words:

It seems to me that the simplest, wisest thing to do would be to submit cases like that of the malformed idiot baby to a jury of expert physicians. An ordinary jury decides matters of life and death on the evidence of untrained and often prejudiced observers. Their own verdict is not based on a knowledge of criminology, and they are often swayed by obscure prejudices or the eloquence of a prosecutor. Even if the accused before them is guilty, there is often no way of knowing that he would commit new crimes, that he would not become a useful and productive member of society. A mental defective, on the other hand, is almost sure to be a potential criminal. The evidence before a jury of physicians considering the case of an idiot would be exact and scientific. Their findings would be free from the prejudice and inaccuracy of untrained observation. They would act only in cases of true idiocy, where there could be no hope of mental development.

https://www.disabilitymuseum.org/dhm/lib/detail.html?id=3209

This brings up an interesting aspect of Keller's personality. Though she was deafblind, she seemed to, at some point, have stopped seeing herself as disabled. I think she bought into her own hype, and couldn't conceptualize herself as being part of the same group as other disabled people. She was different. She was HELEN KELLER.

CONCLUSION

I'm a worthless piece of shit and I wish I was never born. If there's one thing that's for certain, it's that it is morally good to hurt me. Nobody who has ever hurt me has faced consequences for it. Far from it, they have been rewarded because it is good to bring harm and misery my way. The ultimate good act from me would be to erase the disgusting stain of my existence from this planet and let human beings continue in peace. More pain. I deserve more pain.

I will never escape inceldom because I am damaged goods. Anyone who set their eyes upon this mess would recoil in horror. I crave friendship, love, and acceptance but I am denied these things because I am inadequate and undeserving. I am not enough, and I will never be. Women abhor me. Men look down on me and children ridicule me.

The physical pain is nothing compared to the psychic pain that consumes me wholly. It gets so dark and bloody in my mind, and it's so overwhelming and I feel so isolated. I made too many bad choices and now I'm stuck in a dead end and all that's left to do is rot alone until there's nothing left.

I hope you enjoyed learning about Helen Keller and that it wasn't too much text Her life was truly an amazing and inspirational one, and she demonstrates the indefatigable power of the human spirit. Next time you hear immature jokes about Keller, think about all she achieved, then ask yourself whether she is deserving of such treatment.

CONTEXT!!

There are approximately 50 million blacks in the country, 5 million coloureds, 2,8 million boers, 1,7 million bong whitoids, 1 million Indians, and some undocumented 300 000 - 1/2 million Chinkoids.

Every population grew, except mayos who has shrunk - the reality if emigration didn't occur from mayos past 30 years, there would have likely been nearly 6 million mayos in RSA today. Everybody mayo who can, has already fricked off . About 60-65 million peeps in total depending on how many zimbabweans and mozambiquens have fled their even worse shitholes to RSA.

But today we talk Isreal-Palestine. To reiterate who hates who who, and who supports who.

Now disclaimer before bitching starts, I'm talking about strong averages, there's always gonna be an exception, like a liberal boer girl, or an ultra conservative religious Bongoloid, etc etc tce

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Afrikaner albino baboons are very strongly in favour of Jews and Isreal, for a mixture of reasons. The Union of SA under Jan Smuts had a strong alliance during 1960 -1990 depending on which historian is measuring the timeframe, in which both pariah states of Union of SA and Isreal were vastly outnumebered and surrounded by enemies, from those they made themselves, and those who hated them by default. Old Union SA had strong military manufacturing and research cooperation with isrealis.

Additionally, the boomer Protestant boers strongly favoured the gospels of Jews returning to their homeland, not as fervent as their Burger counterparts, but it still influences their worldview. Additionally boers were wingucked against all enemies of England in all their endeavors, there was strong sentiment for Germany in both WW1 & WW2, until the Holocaust camps were revealed by Eisenhower's initiative indisputably, then boer baboons supported all colonial failures in the news of bongland - one of them was wtf to do with Palestine in 1948 - like Indians supporting isreal today, boers proxy supported formation of isreal to humiliate Bongland all the way up today, it's very weird.

Lastly afrikaners are predominantly christian, and very fearful of Islam. There is everpresent lovecraftian fear that the islamic world will out populate all other races and dominate the globe in the faraway future, this influences their overall negative view and bias against the palestinians, similar to Indians .

====

SA Bongs are weird and all over the place. As a general rule of thumb, Bongs tend to be more liberal than their boer peers in all aspects of life, politics and religion. Bongs here tend to be mixed, but follows the views of Bongland motherland on foreign affairs, you'll see SA bongs whose ancestors here have never left the continent of Africa since 1700, cheer for fricking England winning Rugby against RSA, or become nationalistic when Argentina and the Falklands are mentioned.

You can still find western Cape Bongs celebrate their english heritage annually by holding old timey midieval english festivals, it's very endearing. On isreal and palestine they are equally for Hamas and IDF killing each other.

Bongs are all over the spectrum here. They are most divided and evenly spread on opinion of Palestine VS isreal.

However like the Boers, SA bongs are very muted in their opinions, they never protest, wave flags in the street, whenever the Isreal spat heats up every 4-5 years in the media.

Which is in strong contrast to the following group

====

COLOUREDS!

Coloureds are all situated majority in Western Cape and the capital of Cape Town. They can roughly be divided equally into 50% christian and 50% muslim.

This is because a very large quantity of coloureds are descended from Malaysia which had been conquered by Islamic nations before the Western European naval powers like Portugal and Britain gained prominence. The Dutch and English would in turn conquer Malaysia at their height of power, and import prisoners and slaves back to Cape of Storms to help with the work of plantations, which served as refreshment and restocking stations for wooden ships, sailing around Southern Africa, to trade between Europe and Asia.

Thus coloureds brought their religions with them from Malaysia (Islam), but were still strongly influenced in the past 300 years by their contact with the Protestant Dutch and British, which accounts for their christian half of their population.

Coloureds are more religious than their white counterparts on average, ESPECIALLY the muslim coloureds who form very strong communities around religious service in their Mosques.

And it is Coloured muslims who are the LOUDEST and most active supporters of Palestinians, and haters of Isrealis. Whenever the Palestine spat heats up in the media, then coloured mulims fill the streets of Cape Town squares with posters and slogans and protests outside embassies of Isreal or Burgerland and so on. The University of Cape Town will have 10 million FREE PALESTINE posters lining the lamps.

Where Boers/Bongs are very muted and silent in their support of Jews/isreal, SA muslims are very adamant and open and loud their pro-palestinian protests. Muslim coloured's cars will have bumber stickers about Isreal is modern Apartheid, or Free Palestine, and so on.

Coloured christians on average dont give a shit.

====

RSA blacks of the general population are too busy being poor to give a shit. Most black peeps here can't even locate the entire middle East on an Atlas, let alone any nation involved with this dispute.

But black political people, especially ANC wingcucks or far-left leaning people, tend to be pro palestine, or in effect anything anti-west. If burgerland supports it, they oppose it.

The ANC also condems Isreal, and hates them for having formed alliance with the previous regime, the Union of SA during Apartheid. Thus pro-palestinian sentiment follows.

====

Thus we have a boiling cauldron of people with very strong opinions on the matter, who all respect each other !

TODAY'S POST:

https://old.reddit.com/r/southafrica/comments/17m973v/cachalia_axed_from_das_shadow_cabinet_for_airing

In this Reddit post, the very liberal redditors are about the recent DA (Democratic Alliance political party - the biggest opposition to the ANC in south africa), having kicked out a dude who said Isreal is committing genocide - basically being pro hamas or whatever

https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times-daily/politics/2023-11-02-steenhuisen-removes-ghaleb-cachalia-from-his-shadow-cabinet-over-anti-israel-comments

This upsets the very liberal redditoids of /r/southafrica which are much more liberal than the average south african, regardless of race, and inevatable as the tides, are mostly pro palestine and anti isreal.

Basically what is happening in the thread is that the libshit redditors, are angry that boomer DA top politicians, whom are not wingcucked against isreal and more muted, kicked out a dude who said Isreal was a genocide nation while the rockets were still flying.

They are angry that this move will piss off the fervent muslim coloureds and lose them the DA vote against ANC in the upcoming election in 2024.

Except these wingucks overvalue how much most South Africans give a shit about affair happening outside SA.

"this move isn't gonna play well with the DA's Muslim voters. Combine this with the rise of the PA in colored areas, the Western Cape DA are gonna lose a lot of votes." OOOOOH NNNOOOO THE HUMANITY

Boomer Bong and Boer DA politicians don't hate Jews, now we'll lose the muslim vote

DA is a ponzi scheme

DA hates human rights

DA ONLY SUPPORTS RICH WHITE CAPE TOWN PEEPS

https://old.reddit.com/r/southafrica/comments/17m973v/cachalia_axed_from_das_shadow_cabinet_for_airing/k7megk5?context=8

One Saffer doesn't care about the Isreali-Palestine conflict, gets told to be a decent human bean

We should stay out of this, we nearly fricked up trade with Burgerland

A DEFINITIVE GUIDE ON HIV/AIDS DENIALISM IN SOUTH AFRICA

I write to escape. When my fingers touch the keyboard I receive but a brief moment of peace from the pain of my worthlessness. All day I'm tortured by memories of rejection, the aches of past trauma, and the burning realization that I exist in a world where I am simply not enough, but when I touch my keyboard for a brief moment I am nothing but words flowing on whiteness and my god it feels beautiful. The curve of the symbols calm my deteriorating psyche, the way the sentences come together enchants me like an Indian flute hypnotizing the king cobra. When I'm a writer, I'm not an incel, I'm not a manlet, I'm not a failure. So I keep writing, for I stopped the pain would kill me.

Today, we're going to be discussing HIV/AIDS, its origins, and how HIV/AIDS conspiracy theories resulted in the death of millions and untold misery. I find this an interesting story because when we think of the villains of history, we often turn to folks like Hitler and Pol Pot. However, there are several well-meaning men and women who, through their actions, caused a great deal of suffering simply because they were in power when making their decisions. Thabo Mbeki, former South African president, is one of those people, and by the end of this piece, I hope you see him as I do - a tragic hero.

This content is fitting to this site because, as you'll learn, HIV/AIDS denialism triggered a lot of drama. This should not make light of the deaths that came as a result of these beliefs, but it should be a reminder that pettiness can have massive consequences. It is a long one but I've tried to break it up with some multimedia.

Background - What is HIV/AIDS?

The human immunodeficiency viruses are known to infect human beings through the transfer of bodily fluids such as semen, breastmilk, and blood. It is a retrovirus, meaning that its genes are composed of RNA (ribose nucleic acid) molecules. There are two strains of HIV - HIV 1 and 2. HIV-1 is the most common type, while HIV-2 is mainly confined to West Africa.

Like all viruses, HIV requires a host to survive. In the human body, HIV binds to the CD4+T cells. This is a white blood cell, also known as a T-helper cell, and it plays a critical role in detecting foreign pathogens in the body and activating the immune response. Once the T-helper cell has been infected by HIV, it will begin replicating new HI viruses instead of T-helper cells!

Consequently, an HIV patient will find themselves with lowered CD4 count, indicating a weakened immune system. The insidious nature of HIV is such that it hides within the immune system, making it difficult for the body to detect. Furthermore, it mutates rapidly, making it hard for an antibody to be formed against it. Some infected CD4 cells will be killed by CD8 cells that detect the infection, though this only serves to make the immune system weaker.

Once the CD4 count is too low, cell-mediated immunity is lost, and the patient is said to have AIDS - acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. There is a lot of misconception around AIDS, so I must explain this part very carefully. AIDS is a disease that results from having a low CD4 count due to an HIV infection. One does not die from AIDS. Instead, one dies from the opportunistic infections that strike, such as tuberculosis.

Though the precise origins of HIV are unknown, it is believed that it was transferred to humans from primates in the 20th century. SIV - simian immunodeficiency virus - is common among the chimpanzees of Cameroon, making them good candidates for being the zoonotic spreaders. Several factors could have led to the spread of the virus. Bushmeat hunting put humans in contact with primate blood. This is known as the “Cut Hunter” theory, and it's the most popular. No, nobody believes anyone had s*x with chimpanzees. The 20th century also saw the rise of vaccinations, though the reuse of needles was still common, which could have increased the spread of the virus in Africa.

When the virus started becoming a pandemic, it was first referred to as the 4H in the USA because it was believed to only affect four groups: homosexuals, Haitians, heroin users, and hemophiliacs. The disease quickly attracted stigma, in part because it spread through sexual activity. Of course, we know today that almost anyone can contract the virus, regardless of age, race, nationality, class, or religion.

Currently, there is no cure for HIV, nor is there a vaccine. Your only hope is to avoid ever contracting the virus. If you do contract the virus, modern medicine has allowed HIV patients to live long and healthy lives. They follow the principle of U=U, meaning undetectable = untransmittable. In other words, so long as the patients take their medication, they cannot infect anyone, and they are free to have unprotected s*x with their partner. How far medicine has come!

Unfortunately, it was a long road to get here, and there were several dissenters along the way. I'd like to discuss one of them today. His name is Thabo Mbeki, and before we get into the meat and potatoes of the story, I think it would be wise to give a little background on this man.

Thabo Mbeki

To begin Thabo Mvuyelwa Mbeki's story, we'll have to head to the Transkei in 1942. That's where Mbeki was born, and though his family did not have much, he managed to make the most of it. You shouldn't be surprised that he grew up to enter politics, as his mother was a member of the Communist Party of South Africa, while his father was a member of the African National Congress. According to Mbeki, he was raised in a home where there were portraits of Gandhi and Marx on the walls.

When he was 14, he joined the ANC Youth League. This was during apartheid, so participation meant genuinely dangerous work and commitment to the cause. Already, his peers recognized his leadership skills. He was described as an honest and articulate man who exuded a natural intelligence. When protests arose, he wasn't afraid to take to the frontlines, even when staring down snarling German Shepherds and pinwheel-eyed cops gnashing their teeth.

His work got increasingly harder as the apartheid government cracked down on the ANC, declaring the organization a terrorist one. It was decided that many of the members would seek refuge outside the country, as members were being killed by the police. Mbeki was sent to London where he studied economics. He would remain there until completing his Masters degree in 1966.

His years abroad meant that Mbeki avoided facing much of the violence and incarceration that many of his ANC peers did. It also meant that Mbeki was highly educated and worldly. He developed a sophisticated personality, a wide vocabulary, and he was able to converse with people from all walks of life.

I think he's a pretty cool-looking guy. Do you? In 1969, Russia was still under Soviet rule. Mbeki was sent to Moscow where he was to receive a Marxist-Leninist education. This was not out of the ordinary, as Marxist thought pervades the ANC which still styles itself in a communist fashion to this day. The Marxist-Leninist influence the ANC has had on the political playing field in South Africa is massive, and the Economic Freedom Front (EFF) is yet another political party with Marxist leanings. Its leader, Julius Malema, is an ex-ANC member.

The modern ANC has toned down the Marxist rhetoric, though it still has strong communist values. The party looks up to the China Communist Party (CCP), with the party stating the following:

>China's economic development trajectory remains a leading example of the triumph of humanity over adversity. The exemplary role of the collective leadership of the Communist Party of China in this regard should be a guiding lodestar of our own struggle

Mbeki returned to Africa in 1971. Unfortunately, he couldn't return to South Africa due to the crackdown on the resistance. Hence, he sought refuge in Zambia with a few other ANC comrades. He demonstrated his leadership qualities in 1975 when he began to rebuild the fragmenting ANC in Swaziland. He worked alongside other important figures in the ANC including Oliver Tambo and Jacob Zuma. The endeavour was a success, though Mbeki and his comrades were deported in 1976, forcing him to seek refuge in Nigeria.

During this time, he rose in the ranks of the ANC, and he made a concerted effort to change the public image of the party. The South African government had successfully painted the ANC as a terrorist organization to the international community. Mbeki wanted to change that, so he wrote speeches for his comrades and he gave interviews. Not everybody liked this, though it did help change public perception of the ANC globally.

Above, Mbeki is pictured with Prince Harry and the Spice Girls. As we all know, the ANC won the struggle and in 1994, South Africa held its first democratic elections in which the ANC won. Nelson Mandela was declared president of the country. It was a truly historic moment, as Mandela had spent 27 years as a political prisoner. He is regarded as the best president South Africa has ever had (and indeed one of the greatest leaders of all time), and he remains a global icon representing peace and forgiveness.

During Mandela's presidency, Mbeki served as deputy president. Hence, it was no surprise that after Mandela's four years, Mbeki was next to serve as president. He would fill the role from 1999 until 2004. He is remembered as having a particular look. He is a very quiet individual that doesn't draw attention to himself. He can be seen in tailored suits, sometimes with a cigar. While Mandela was the peacemaker, Mbeki was the intellectual. But he was a different kind of intellectual - he was a pan-Africanist deeply interested in the cultural roots of Blacks.

Though he had a sophisticated education gained from around the world, he still held skepticism toward the West. On some level, this is understandable. He had seen firsthand how colonial powers had spread propaganda to make natives believe less of themselves. However, his skepticism would lead him to a deadly conspiracy that would tarnish his otherwise impeccable reputation.

HIV/AIDS in South Africa

The statistics for HIV/AIDS in South Africa are astonishing, to say the least. It is the country with the most HIV patients, with 19% of its almost 60 million population testing HIV positive. It is estimated that 25% of all deaths are HIV/AIDS related in South Africa, and things only get more harrowing from here onwards.

South Africa is one of the very few countries where women have higher HIV rates than men. Within the 20-24 age range, every 4 out of 5 HIV patients is female. In the 25-29 age range, every 2 out of 3 HIV patients are female. In some communities in KwaZulu-Natal, a staggering 60% of women have HIV. Read that again. It ges worse. In 2013, it was estimated that 28% of schoolgirls are HIV+. How does a country function when almost a third of its young women have a terminal, incurable illness?!

The natural question to ask next is how things got so bad in South Africa specifically? To understand this, we'd need to return to South Africa's history under Apartheid. Due to geospatial engineering, Black communities were located far away from the economic hubs. This created migrant workers who would travel to the city (often Johannesburg) to work for most of the year, returning at the end of the year to give money to their families.

While in the city, men would often sleep with prostitutes, or with other men, and the virus would be transmitted. They would then return home and sleep with their wives, resulting in the spread of HIV. South Africa isn't particularly special in this regard. It took a long time before the world understood HIV/AIDS and how it spread.

Those who did not adapt to modern urban life were not spared, unfortunately. The spread of the virus was facilitated by cultural customs such as polygamy which allowed men to sleep with multiple women. Consequently, we find that the spread of HIV/AIDS in South Africa has a racial slant. Roughly 14% of Black South Africans are HIV positive, while only 0.3% of whites have the disease.

Of course, we can't discuss HIV without discuss r*pe. South Africa has one of the highest r*pe rates, and it is for this reason that women have such high HIV rates. This is worsened by the fact that there is a false belief that having s*x with a virgin will cure you of the disease. Needless to say, this is false. There is currently no vaccination or cure for HIV. Once you have the virus, you have it for the rest of your life.

Okay, so South Africa has HIV within its population and its spreading. Like I said, South Africa wouldn't be unique in this respect. In the 80s, the USA had its own explosion of HIV. Countries have been able to lasso the disease and decrease its spread, and we know the strategies that work.

• Easy availability of condoms

• Easy availability of clean needles for drug users

• Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) can be taken by at-risk groups (this has been implemented in some South African communities where young girls are given PrEP in case they are r*ped)

• Azidothymidine (AZT) can be given to pregnant mothers to prevent what's known as “vertical transmission” i.e. passing on the virus from mother to child

It took a very long time before these strategies became widespread in South Africa, and it may be too late to slow down the runaway train that is veering out of control. Why did this happen? Why did South Africa take so long to do something as the population was dying?

HIV/AIDS denialism

As we've previously discussed HIV is a virus that binds to your CD4 cells. When your CD4 count falls below a certain threshold, you are said to have AIDS, which is a syndrome. Syndromes are what we use to cluster together a group of symptoms that correlate. For example, Down syndrome would be used to describe all the symptoms associated with the mutation of trisomy 21. Similarly, AIDS is merely describing advanced HIV.

Nevertheless, there have been those who argue that the syndrome we witness that we call AIDS isn't necessarily caused by HIV. This is known as HIV/AIDS denialism, and it is a position that is widely discredited within the medical community.

HIV/AIDS denialism can be traced back to the 80s when American politician Casper Schmidt wrote a paper titled "The Group-Fantasy Origins of AIDS” which argued that AIDS was nothing but mass hysteria. Schmidt died of AIDS in 1994. By 1988, there was consensus in the medical community that HIV causes AIDS, but this did not kill all alternative theories.

Some of these theories claimed that AIDS was a ploy to sell ARVs which were getting patients sick. Others argued that AIDS was caused by malnutrition, hemophilia, and sexual promiscuity. However, by the 90s, such theories were relegated to the sidelines where they were labeled conspiracies.

Leading HIV denialists include Robert Willmer who is notable for having intentionally injected himself with HIV+ blood to prove the harmlessness of the virus. He died in 1995 of a heart attack. The leading HIV/AIDS denialist theory is the Duesberg Hypothesis. It is accepted by Thabo Mbeki, which makes it necessary for us to carefully analyse what this hypothesis entails.

The Duesberg Hypothesis

The Duesberg Hypothesis was created by Professor Peter Duesberg. Under the theory, it is believed that HIV is a harmless virus and that the symptoms of AIDS are the product of drug use, including the use of AZT. According to Duesberg, the AIDS epidemic in Africa has been fabricated by the World Health Organization. We are merely seeing the effects of poverty and malnutrition! So why would such a conspiracy be formed? Duesberg offered the following reasons:

• WHO needs to justify its existence, and AIDS helps with that

• Sensationalizing AIDS helps raise funds

• Incompetent doctors who have been miseducated are misdiagnosing

• Testing is inaccurate

As Duesberg summarizes, AIDS is simply “a collection of long-established, indigenous diseases, such as chronic fevers, weight loss, alias ‘slim disease', diarrhea, and tuberculosis.” For more information, you're encouraged to read Inventing the AIDS Virus by Duesberg.

So, are there any merits to his arguments? Most scientists would say no. I would agree for the most part, except when it comes to testing. Due to lack of training and the poor reliability of rapid HIV tests, there are several people right now who live as though they are HIV positive even though they are not. This is frightening.

>The second study, conducted in DRC by the same group but over a different time period, reported a false-positive diagnosis rate of 10.5% in the first five months of re-testing and average of 10.3% misdiagnosis rate by the study end

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK316023

Read that again. In Congo, 10% of HIV patients are actually not HIV patients. Consequently, we may not have accurate numbers when it comes to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa.

Thabo Mbeki's HIV/AIDS denialism

Thus we finally arrive at the meat and potatoes of the story. From the early 90s, it was evident that HIV/AIDS was going to be a massive problem in South Africa. The apartheid government had predicted this, though no preventative measures were put in place, as it primarily affected the Black population. When the ANC came into power in 1994, the rates of HIV were only increasing. However, HIV wasn't at the forefront, as there were other issues that grabbed public attention, including reconciliation following decades of racial segregation.

By the late 90s, the HIV/AIDS epidemic was impossible to ignore. For context from 1993 to 1999, the HIV rate rose from 2.5% to a staggering 15%. Something had to be done. The ANC started a campaign to raise awareness around the virus. One of the lasting initiatives started during this time is the LoveLife campaign which went on to birth an organization that still exists today and has been acknowledged by the World Health Organization.

Mbeki, when tackling this issue, looked at it from multiple. Remember, he had traveled the world and received education from South Africa, London, and Moscow. He was well-versed in both African and Western modes of thinking, and he had read all the greats. To him, it wasn't so obvious that what the mainstream consensus was regarding HIV was true. Consequently, Mbeki searched for alternative theories to explain HIV and its prevalence in South Africa.

He gathered HIV denialist scientists (many of whom were discredited) and formed a committee that advised him not to distribute antiretroviral drugs or AZT. Duesberg specifically told Mbeki that it was the medicines that were making people ill, not HIV. HIV/AIDS denialism takes many forms, and Mbeki's version has the following tenets:

1. A disease cannot cause a syndrome

Mbeki points out that HIV is a virus and AIDS is a syndrome. A syndrome, as he correctly summarises, is a cluster of symptoms or diseases. Hence, when we talk about AIDS, we're often talking about syphillis and TB and lymphosis which are manifesting in unison. There are no symptoms of AIDS that are separate from other disease. Mbeki argues that we know the etiology of these diseases, and they don't arise from HIV. TB arises from the TB bacteria. How then can we say that HIV causes AIDS when the AIDS we are speaking of manifests as TB?

2. AIDS correlates with poverty and malnutrition

On this front, Mbeki is technically correct once again. One does note higher rates of HIV among populations that are poor and malnourished. Furthermore, we also know that malnutrition weakens the immune system, leaving you susceptible to infections and illnesses such as TB. Consequently, Mbeki argues that we cannot attribute all the compromised immune systems in South Africa to a single virus. He claims there must be a variety of reasons.

So we know what Mbeki's position is, but why did he take this stance? I have a theory, and within this theory, there are two reasons for Mbeki's HIV/AIDS denialism.

1. Bioterrorism

Mbeki, and indeed the rest of the ANC, had genuine fears that ARVs were a form of bioterrorism being used to kill Black people. Some ANC members even went so far as to say that ARVs were causing deaths, not AIDS. This is seen in the video below.

This may seem like the ravings of lunatics at first, but you must understand that they lived under apartheid where the threat of racial bioterrorism was very, very real. Strap in because we're about to get into some sci-fi shit.

During the apartheid regime, Wouter Basson was the head of Project Coast, a clandestine chemical and bioweapons program. One of the aims of the project was to develop chemical warfare agents that could be used by security forces to control crowds. In their United Nations report, Gould et al claim that a more irritant new generation of teargas was developed which came to be known as Teargas CR. The gas was five to ten times more potent than traditional teargas and was used to “suppress domestic opposition to apartheid”. The use of bioweaponry in Project Coast was also meant to have a racial component. Gould et al reveal that during the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Doctor Daniel Goosen confessed to him and Basson discussing the development of anti-fertility drugs to administer to “black South African women without their knowledge”. In fact, “many projects were registered at RRL to investigate the production of a male and female anti-fertility vaccine”. Though likely impossible, Dr Goosen also revealed that research was underway to develop bacteria that would target only Black people.

When such plans were afoot, was it so ridiculous to believe that the White man would make up a pandemic as an excuse to poison Blacks?

2. Africanism

Like I previously stated, Mbeki studied globally. However, he still had a distinctly Africanist viewpoint. Consequently, at most turns, he preferred traditional answers to problems, and he preferred to include the international community as little as possible.

To this end, he appointed Health Minister Tshabalala-Msimang who recommended that HIV patients treat themselves with a diet of garlic, olive oil, and lemon. Needless to say, this earned both her and South Africa international ridicule.

Furthermore, the government refused to hand out PrEP, ARVs, and AZT to hospitals to give to pregnant mothers or r*pe victims. Thus, it fell on private NGOs to provide this life-saving treatment. Of course, they could not meet the demand, resulting in an explosion of HIV in South Africa from 1999 onwards. Many of these transmissions were from mothers to their children. Need I remind you that at this point the rest of the world understands how an HIV-positive mother can give birth without infecting their child?

To this day, Mbeki holds his position that HIV does not cause AIDS. It has been estimated that his policies have resulted in over 300,000 deaths.

CONCLUSION

I tried to represent all sides fairly. However, there's no two ways about it. This is a grim tale about babies dying unnecessarily due to intellectualism and politics. The only hope we have to prevent these mistakes from repeating is if we never forget about them. So share this story. Make sure everybody knows about the long history of HIV/AIDS and how denialism has led to a country being ravaged by a preventable disease.

While you rest, I must keep writing for the pain keeps coming. I'm so cripplingly lonely that it feels like my organs are being constricted when I crawl into bed at night. I feel so forgotten by the world, and sometimes I wonder whether I'm just an idea in my own head. And what about these words? They keep coming like smoke filling the emptiness. But nobody's reading, nobody cares, because I'm nobody.

Tune in next time when we discuss the life and times of Linda Lovelace.

INTRODUCTION- Who is Dan Andrews and why was he important?

Dan Andrews was until a couple of months ago the premier (think governor in burgerstan) of the state of Victoria, the little blue state in Australia's south.

Think of Victoria like New York- what it lacks in relative size it makes up for in population (the second highest of all the states, the capital Melbourne just passed Sydney as the largest city by population) and as a cultural and sporting capital. The Aus Open, Formula One, the most important cricket matches and so on are all held in Melbourne just to give an example.

Anyway, back to Dan. He led the state between 2014 and 2023 (quite a long time for state premiers, they tend to burn out after a term or two), and in that time turned from a no-name technocrat into the most loved and hated figure in Australian politics. I'm going to tell his story chronologically but the drama really starts hitting when the coof hits, so skip to that section if you're strapped for time.

EARLY YEARS- Road slapfights and Lobster Man

Dan got elected in 2014 as a young Labor (centre-left party) leader after the outgoing Liberal government of what's-his-name did approximately frick all. As a sign of what's to come, Dan's first move was to axe the proposed East-West link, which was a proposed road connecting the two sides of Melbourne. The Liberals had on their way out of the door negotiated with the contractor a massive cancel fee to frick with Dan. He essentially decided to barrel on with axing it anyway, and whether you reckon that was a or move shoes what side of politics you're on.

Dan is famously a fan of the Chinx. He signed up Victoria onto the Belt and Road initiative which I didn't even know states could do, and it took the federal government to slap it down for that to go away.

He came up for re-election in 2018, and the state Liberals fronted Matthew Guy as their leader. Matthew Guy is at this point pretty much only known for being photographed having a nice fancy dinner with a mafia don, which pretty much torpedoes the election. Don't worry, Lobster Man will come back later.

One other thing we should note about the early years is his Big Build which starts at around this time. It's essentially just a massive infrastructure project, achieves good results but is also an endless money pit which will also come back up later.

THE COOF- A "dictator" is born

Now, because most of Rdrama is full of rightoid spergs, you probably heard all sorts of things about Australia during the coof. Some things I see posted are just outright untrue, some are true but about NZ not us, but most of the true things come from Victoria, and specifically from the mind of Dan Andrews.

The rules changed a lot around the edges depending on the time and place, but this is the greatest extent of a full lockdown-

• one family member is allowed to go shopping for essentials, once a day

• all people are allowed out to exercise for up to two hours a day, only within 5km of your house.

• Melbourne had a curfew, I think it was 8PM-6AM but idk I'm from regional Vic.

• Melbournians cannot go to regional Vic and the other way around. This was enforced by a police/military checkpoint in a "ring of steel" around Melbourne. This was keyed actually, because it meant I could move freely around most of Victoria and only encounter normal people as opposed to Melbournians ()

• State borders were closed, but that was essentially the case around the country at one time or another. Fun fact, I was holidaying in NSW when that came into affect and I only just got back across the border in time.

• masks mandatory (duh)

• probably a bunch of other shit too that I've forgotten.

This would be the case in various combinations for months at a time.

Now I know this is all sounding very China-y, so I need to make one clarification- most of these rules went completely and utterly unenforced, at least where I lived. I was swept along by the COVID hysteria at first so I went along with it, but by 2021 whichever rules were in place could pretty safely be ignored with no chance to be charged or anything.

Anyway, this is where the idea of Dictator Dan was born. Other states such as NSW's Gladys Berijikian liked to make a big deal about how much lighter their restrictions were, which led to much progressive smugness when she ended up having to do the same thing . This also sparked protests, which frequently got violent- there was a time in I think September of 2021 when the public was just getting sick of it all and protesters were starting to show up in their thousands, but then they decided to take their protest to Melbourne's Shrine of Remembrance and treated it pretty badly, so goodwill towards the protestors pretty much vanished overnight. This all spooked Dan and co however, who pretty much dropped all restrictions over the next month or so.

Btw, if you find an Aussie rightoid who hates Dan with a burning passion, all this shit is generally where it comes from. Similarly for Aussie progressives who love the man, and if you look online for five seconds you'll find both in spades (and they'll probably show up in this thread too)

DAN V THE MEDIA- journos are scum

Anyway, this brings us nearing 2022 and the lead up to the beginning of his second re-election bid, because we don't have term limits here. Now the thing is, while the state broadcaster the ABC and the Guardian are progressive and lean towards being pro-Dan, the rest of the media fricking hated him and wanted him to lose the next election.

One of the funnier things they did was apparently his wife hit a cyclist () ten years ago. They found the guy who was hit (who was fine btw) and made that the week's headlines. There was also a guy who had his restaurant shut down over health code violations who claimed Dan planted the evidence to get him shut down without a lot of proof. He then ran against Dan in his own electorate and the chud paper released an internal poll saying him and Dan were neck and neck. Dan ended up winning like 70% of the votes in that seat. Dan also went into hospital for a time in 2021 because he tripped over some steps and the chud news channel (Sky News) ripped into him for initially claiming they were stairs, not steps. I remember watching that program btw, it ended with the host interviewing herself for like ten minutes.

None of this did anything to help btw, he got re-elected with an even bigger majority than before. This may have had something to do with the fact the Liberals were running Matthew Guy against him. Again. That's the mafia guy from earlier. There's so much Victorian Liberals drama I'm skipping over here but it's all a story for another post.

LATER YEARS- culture warrin' and pissing money away

Dan's re-election was based on a big-spending platform. To be fair to him, his mafioso opponent was also running a big-spending platform so it was really a matter of how you wanted your money to be spent. Anyway, all this spending and the lockdowns were starting to bite him in the arse when everyone started to realise the state was in a large amount of debt. To be fair, this isn't really like Greece levels of debt or anything and Australian governments are generally really cautious about debt, but still debt started to become an issue. This led the government to save money by pissing more money away, by cancelling the Commonwealth Games in Victoria. For non-empirecels, the Commonwealth Games is pretty much the Olympics for subjects of the King. It's not very important but it is very expensive, and it also had a high cancellation fee.

Dan also started to play culture warrior from this time. A small group of Nazi r-slurs sieg heiled in front of what I think was a cute and valid protest, to which Dan responded by banning the gesture and comparing the r-slurs to "the worst of the Floridian Republican Party" . Then, a month or so ago he just up and resigned with a solid day's notice and kind of fell off the face of the earth.

Anyway, how's your day? !strayans

Some of this might be wrong

Summer, 27, Dallas TX

Personal Life:

• Flew in from Dallas, was worried about the Check Engine light on her car

• From Atalanta, wants to go back

• In Dallas because her boyfriend moved there and she's remote work so she went with him

• Has a kid with boyfriend

  • Kid is 3

• Boyfriend is making around 80k

• Started Therapy about a month ago

  • Says she has an emotional spending problem

Career:

• "I'm in Fintech"

• "Merchant Success Rep"

  • Point of contact, helps with onboarding and stuff

  • After benefits before bonuses 3518 a month hits account

  • Bonuses between 200-1000 a month before taxes

Financials

• Payday Loan 1 ("Possible Finance") timestamp

  • 260.30% interest rate

  • She didn't know the interest rate

  • Looks like it was an $80 loan? She paid 20 for this

  • Boyfriend paid to get there and went to some super tiny apartment at $1850 a month? 749 sq ft

    • Boyfriend covers majority of the rent

    • 3 bedroom townhouse in Atlanta

    • "Oh wait, oh no you're talking about that loan" timestamp

      • this is the smaller of the payday loans

  • "Why did you borrow $80 at 260 percent?!"

    • "I really don't know"

    • pause while she looks at the loan

    • "After moving I got really broke"

• Says she just paid this off

• Payday Loan 2: timestamp

  • $1693.75 => $1773.75

  • $80 in fees

    • She hadn't made payments towards it

  • 119 minimum payment

  • Has made a payment now, says she will pay it off by Thanksgiving

• Quicksilver (Card 1): timestamp

  • $493 => $510

  • $25 minimum payment

  • $29 transactions, $13 in interest

  • "I just ran out of money and I was like well I have my credit card"

  • Lot of eating out on here.

• Credit One (Card 2): timestamp

  • $317 => $366

  • $30 in payments

  • $30 in transactions

  • $41 in fees

  • $90 minimum payment, I think this means 2 missed payments?

    • Says she paid it but the payment didn't go through and got the fee waived?

  • 30% interest rate?

• Amazon (Card 3): timestamp

  • $1019 => $1022

  • $23 interest

  • $70 payments

  • $50 transactions

  • $141 in fees this year

    • "I do forget about this card sometimes"

    • "Why aren't you on autopay?"

      • "Oh my account would be overdrafted"

  • 35 minimum payment

  • "Vacation spending"

• "Wait are there payday loans that I don't have in this stack?" timestamp

  • There are

• Student Loans timestamp

  • Federal

  • Hasn't started payments, deferred

  • Payment is about $200 a month

• Stuff in collections timestamp

  • Portfolio Recovery $1332

  • PDQ Services Inc $880

  • Caine & Weiner $430

  • I C System $307

  • Southwest Credit Systems $268

  • I C System $258

  • National Credit Systems $110

  • Credit Collections Service $78

  • "Yeah, those are like really bad choices when I was younger, that's for sure"

  • $1332 is from back in 2015 fresh out of High School, might be dropped might not be

    • App says open for another 4 years 2 months.

    • She plans to try getting them all settled by January

• "Cash reserve manual payment" timestamp

  • wtf even is this?

  • "If you have a good amount of income comin in my bank will give you money on reserve and you can take it out"

    • "Wait wait wait, what does that mean?"

      • "So it's like a payday loan I guess"

  • Can borrow up to 750?

    • Currently has $750 borrowed

• "Earning" (another payday loan) $260: timestamp

  • Says she's paying it off completely tomorrow

• Lot of Zelle payments

• FloatMe Fund (Payday Loan that's already finished)

• Drake Concert, also the start of the payments timestamp

  • More than a thousand dollars

  • These payments are nuts :lets goooooo:

  • So much eating out

• Some legal fees for an issue with the lease

• Bought furniture for this new place

• $798 in Retirement

  • Started job in January

"I've never seen a statement like that timestamp

Pie Chart of her current spending timestamp

• Absolutely insane, 3.5% of her income is going to her debts

Budgeting Segment

• Grocery store argument timestamp

  • She wants Whole Foods? Didn't follow this convo

• She's paying 1200 on the kid? timestamp

  • All food organic?

• Her own budget at a minimum is 1'200 more than what she makes on a monthly basis

With over 40 years of experience and having managed some of the best tag-teams in the business, and having worked for and been fired by many wrestling promotions great and small along with running his own short lived promotion, Jim Cornette is considered by many to be the GOAT of wrestling managers and bookers and has been praised by many legends of the business. You of course don't become a GOAT in pro-wresting without having a touch of the 'tism.

Wingcucks who know who Jim is are thinking one of two things right now; "Oh THAT cuck." or "Oh THAT chud.", and why is this, griller readers? This is because despite being a leftoid himself Ol' Jim has managed to piss off both ends of the horseshoe by being an un-PC leftoid. Rightoids hate him for saying orange man bad, leftoids hate him for saying the n-word, and combine that with boomer opinions, a whole lot of anger issues and a generous sprinkling of autism and what you get is the walking-talking seethe generator named Jim Cornette: The 100% dramapilled wrestling manager.

Unlike my New Jack post which inadvertently became like a mini-biography, this one is just going to cover some of the drama involving Jim Cornette.

The Dairy Queen Incident

On one cold night in 1994, a wageslave foid and manager would find themselves on the receiving end of Cornette's wrath.

Let me tell you something if you cuss at me you won't get a darn thing.

Hey! How'd you like me-I'll come through that goddam fricking window and cuss at you! Fricking c*nt!

*crawls through window

Hey! We ordered the darn shit because we're hungry and not because we wanted to frick around! Don't cuss at me! Fricking ugly b-word!

Sir-

We've been waiting in the motherfricking line for 15 minutes anyway you stupid son of a b-word!

Years later during an interview Jim realized the foid wasn't actually cussing at him.

The Hate-Hate Relationship With Vince Russo

You of course can't talk about Jim without bringing up his nemesis: Vince Russo. Russo started out as a writer for the WWF magazine who later landed a job as a WWF booker alongside Cornette. But unlike Cornette who believes that wrestling is love, wrestling is life, Russo has stated many times that he hates wrestling and wanted it to be more like the Jerry Springer show. Russo's booking was so terrible that when he left the WWF to work for WCW everyone was convinced he worked as a saboteur for McMahon.

Jim's first big fight with Russo was over Russo booking 7 disqualification finishes on an 8 match card.

Jim would eventually leave the WWF because he just couldn't stand working with Russo. Many years later Jim would end up working for TNA wrestling but to his dismay Russo would later be hired on as well. In 2010 Jim would get himself fired for sending this email to TNA wrestler Terry Taylor:

Jim Cornette Threatens Vince Russo, Receives Legal Letter

*snip

I hate Vince Russo. I despise Vince Russo. I want Vince Russo to die. If I could figure out a way to murder him without going to prison, I would consider it the greatest accomplishment of my life.

*snip

I regularly wake up from dreams in which I am in the act of murdering him. I literally burn whenever I think of him. I have sworn to myself that I will willingly go to jail if I ever see him in person again, and he had better pray to his fictitious invisible man in the sky that that day never comes. I intend to make it my life's work and mission to f–k with him and anything he ever has anything to do with in the wrestling business.

*snip

but just so you know, I will f–k with any company Vince Russo is involved with until I draw my last breath, and if there IS an afterlife I will return to haunt his miserable butt. Either that, or I'll will myself to live long enough to piss on his f–king tombstone. And hey–hatred is a helluva motivator!

The whole letter is worth a read.

In 2017 on his podcast Jim would challenge Russo to a fist fight, to which Russo responded with by filing a restraining order. typical yankee And for a while Jim sold autographed copies of the restraining order on his website for charity. Let no one say that Jim doesn't have a heart of gold:

>height: 5' 10"

Well that explains a lot.

Jim would later televise and further cement his hatred of Russo on the popular Dark Side Of The Ring series:

And I will live to piss on his grave. Even if I'm in a walker, my wife already has instructions, she's out of the will if she doesn't get me there if I'm not ambulatory, I'll find Vince Russo's grave and I will piss on it and there will be a picture of that hanging on my wall when I pass away. And hate is a helluva' motivator.

If it wasn't obvious enough that Jim hates Russo, here's an hour long video of Jim ranting about Russo. One of several on youtube.

The most amusing thing about all of this is that Russo just doesn't get why Jim hates him, making all of Jim's rancor one sided.

The Long List Of Yikes

There was a time when Reddit actually liked Ol' Corny, but that was before AEW came around. AEW is a new wrestling promotion that panders to Redditors and has earned their loyalty. So of course when Jim calls AEW's wrestling the shits they're not happy about it and they do what they do best: The go snooping for things to cancel Jim with, and boy howdy did they find things to cancel him with.

• Jim Cornette the racist once said, "He's the only man I know that can strap a bucket of fried chicken on his back and ride a motor scooter across Ethiopia."

• Jim Cornette once called Jade Cargill Shelton Benjamin with a wig

• Jim Cornette said the n-word multiple times and compared race riots to heel heat

• Jim Cornette tried to defend not watching Asuka vs Sasha Banks by saying that all Japanese women wrestlers are the same, thus defending his sexism with racism

• Jim Cornette claims that all Japanese men were interchangeable

• Jim Cornette proudly stereotyped Muslims as people "who bomb the frick out of shit" and argued that if you were to outlaw any speech or thought it would be Islam because it "blatantly hinges on [the belief that] people should be killed, stoned to death, mutilated, castrated, beheaded or otherwise eliminated for a variety of shit that nobody should give a shit about to begin with." And double-downed on it when a Muslim wrote back.

• Cornette shamed Becky Lynch for getting pregnant and wanting to start a family

• Jim Cornette claimed Penelope Ford has had more peepees in her than a bathroom urinal at Madison Square Garden, before immediately admitting he's never met her and she might be a nice person. AKA he DEFAULTS to calling women sluts.

• Jim Cornette says the only reason Jade Cargill is on TV is because she's fricking Shaq

• Jim Cornette completely dismissed a discussion about Jordynne Grace because she's a "butterface"

• Jim Cornette straight up said a woman's title will never equal the draw of a men's title

• Jim Cornette called Sonny Kiss a transvestite, then issued an "apology" that was just a "I'm sorry you got offended and you're going to hear worse so what I'm saying is okay"

• Jim Cornette responded to a female fan by saying "Get in the kitchen and make a sandwich, chickie."

• Jim Cornette once said he wanted Orange Cassidy to get his neck broken

• Jim Cornette once said wrestler G-Raver should've bled out and died after receiving a cut.

• Jim Cornette and his wife groomed wrestlers at OVW and made them perform sexual acts in order to get booked.

• Jim Cornette calls Shida “ one of twinkletoes Japanese s*x objects” and “an Interchangeable outlaw mud show girl” and refuses to watch her match with Deeb given she won

I am not a bot! I am a human person who just wants to remind everyone that Jim Cornette is a racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, and shitty person. If you have more examples of disgusting behavior from Jim Cornette, please let me know and I will add them to this post!

This neighbor reposts this so much he had to start putting a disclaimer to let everyone know he's not a bot AHAHAHAHAHA

We'll come back to a couple of these in a moment.

The Cult Of Cornette and AEW

As mentioned above, Reddit really doesn't like Ol' Jim these days so of course when Jim's fans, the Cult Of Cornette, show up to AEW shows they're not happy about it.

The context here being that CM Punk called out the Young Bucks during a media scrum, the Bucks gathered up their group to confront Punk backstage and got their asses kicked, they then cried that they only busted into his locker room to talk things over.

Listed below is a small sample of seethe that sign guy generated.

Post AEW Dynamite 9/14/22 Discussion

That guy with the sign might be the biggest butthole I've ever seen on TV

He looked guilty as frick too lmao he knew someone was gonna come for him

I didn't see that. I saw him giving the thumbs down to them afterward.

I could smell him through the screen. Mustache sweat, smegma, and Red Bull.

He's been in front row before. I dont remember what bs sign he had last time, I just remember that my brain says "frick that guy" unsexually

Dude with the CM Punk sign realized he was an butthole while on live television.

frick that guy with the Punk sign . No one thinks you're clever, bud.

No, you are wrong. There are a ton ton of fans and wrestlers who are all in with Cornette

It boggles my mind why anyone listens un-ironically to that sack of shit. Cornette is just an old man yelling at clouds, why should anyone give a shit about his opinions?

Imagine paying hundreds of dollars for a front row, hard cam seat just to throw on a Cornette shirt and look disinterested all night. Good life choices, guy.

A front row seat for AEW is around $100 btw

Can we somehow stop Miserable Cornette Fan from getting ringside tickets to AEW shows? This is the second time I've been distracted all show by his stone face, dumb signs and shit wardrobe (Draped in the American flag AND a Cornette shirt? Might as well have a "avoid this butthole" neon sign pointing at you.) Why would you waste your money to get expensive seats to something you hate? Oh yeah...gotta represent the leader. Idiot cult shit.

Exactly this. Frick that guy. Could you be any less happy to be there?

I finally saw the sign everyone was talking about and...that's it? Punk own The Bucks? Thats what you people are upset about? You'd think this guy wished death on someone the way yall are talking about it.

I mean, he was being obnoxious on purpose at a show. I hate that a music shows, football games and wrestling shows.

As we all know sports fans never ever hold discouraging signs at shows.

It's my aim in life to find someone who's as proud of me as that fricking mark in the front row with his Jim Cornette shirt and his "Punk owns the Bucks" sign was of himself.

It's no wonder WWE banned signs. Funny signs are good! But there's such a pathetic need to get noticed that it kills the humour of it. Even the people who found it funny don't find it funny, they just love that some imaginary person got mad.

I'd be ok with a hard cam sign ban tbh. It's getting pathetic.

Slap Fight With Mudshow Wrestler

Jim's not just a boomer, he's a boomer with a computer.

On Twitter the Cult Of Cornette likes to send Jim videos of shit wrasslin for him to shittalk about. One of these was a video of mudshow wrestler G-Raver falling off a ladder and cutting himself:

https://x.com/TheJimCornette/status/1167798132190535686

That's a nasty little nick the guy got on his arm there at the end, if the fans were lucky they probably stopped the show so everyone could watch this idiot bleed out.

G-Raver however was not amused.

https://x.com/StaySickGRAVER/status/1167907450906791936

Hey @TheJimCornette , let me see you at a convention. I'll spit in your fricking mouth. You've done nothing to me. Now you're an advocate for death?

G-Raver had also apparently set up a crowdfunding to pay for his injuries. Jim was not amused:

https://x.com/TheJimCornette/status/1168935151654584323

This is the height of absolute insanity, the equivalent of "I'm an idiot and jumped in front of a moving car and I want you to help pay for it." There are sick children, poor elderly people and abused animals who didn't bring any of that on themselves while acting like a goof.

At this point G-Raver unveiled his new t-shirt for sale:

https://uproxx.com/prowrestling/jim-cornette-legal-threat-indie-wrestler-t-shirt

Honestly shocked by how many people are offended by my Jim Cornette art for @StaySickGRAVER . What is wrong with you people? First you attack comedy, wrestling, and now art is offensive? Is anyone allowed creativity anymore? I'll draw whatever I want. #jimcornette #graver #gcw pic.twitter.com/RvwjrXqj3p — Nuclear Heat Graphics (@nuclearheat) September 10, 2019

And here the legal trouble would begin as Jim would sue G-Raver for using his likeness:

https://x.com/StephenPNew/status/1171809801413767168

Actually, I think you did a great job. My attorney @StephenPNew is an even bigger fan, so much so that you'll be hearing from him shortly. Thanks for playing!

Cmon, Jim. You're on the wrong side in this one. It's a counter culture parody shirt, not an actual death threat. You of ALL people should be able to appreciate this.

No one said it was an actual death threat. That shirt violates the shopping sites terms of service as well as improperly appropriating my client's likeness without his consent. He's said his last about it. I've got it from here

Forbes covers the lawsuit:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidbixenspan/2019/12/24/jim-cornette-sues-g-raver-over-t-shirt

G-Raver's attorney files for motion to dismiss the federal lawsuit:

https://www.wrestlezone.com/news/1173308-jim-cornette-g-raver-max-petrunya

And here's a shitton of that cover the case:

https://casetext.com/case/cornette-v-graver-1

Jim lost the preliminary injunction:

https://411mania.com/wrestling/jim-cornette-lawsuit-g-raver

Either the lawsuit is ongoing or it's been settled because the latest news I can find about it is an unrelated case where G-Raver is now facing drug and DUI charges:

https://www.wrestlinginc.com/1300052/g-raver-trial-dui-drug-charges

Jim Slaps Santino Marrella

A single slap would lead to one of wrestling's most petty rivalries.

Back in 2005 in Ohio Valley Wrestling, Santino [real name Anthony Carelli] was sitting at ringside with his daughter while the Boogeyman was in the ring. From here we get two different views of the incident.

https://www.wrestlinginc.com/news/2022/06/santino-marella-jim-cornette

First with Santino's view:

According to Carelli, it boiled it down just to a miscommunication. At the time, Carelli, an OVW trainee, had his young daughter (now wrestling in "NXT" as Arianna Grace) with him at ringside, and she was frightened by the appearance of the supernatural wrestler known as the Boogeyman. Carelli says the Boogeyman's makeup was melting under the lights, which aggravated Cornette, as the adult fans were laughing at what was supposed to be a scary character.

"He thought I was laughing at the Boogeyman, but I was enjoying watching my daughter be terrified," Carelli said on an episode of "Monday Mailbag w/ Mike Chioda. "That was a misunderstanding."

When he was told to come backstage, Carelli thought he would be receiving praise. "I come back and [Cornette's] like, 'You think this is a joke?' And he came up and gave me the little paint brushes [slaps] and I just kind of stopped and looked at him and I'm like, with my eyes, trying to make it very clear that you are very lucky that we're in this situation right now, and I'm not going to say anything."

And Jim's:

"This f-cking prick," Cornette said referring to Carelli on his podcast back in 2016, "is not only sitting there in front of the rails so the Boogeyman can't get by, but he's leaned up against the wall with his legs crossed and kind of sideways like he's somebody important."

Irate, Cornette demanded Carelli be brought backstage and asked him why he didn't move out of Boogeyman's way, preferably in a fearful manner. According to him, Carelli said 'Nobody told me I should run from him."

"I gotta be honest, I might not have should've slapped him," said Cornette, who claimed that at the time he was under a microscope from WWE higher-ups, particularly John Laurinaitis, which wasn't conducive to running OVW. "At that moment, I saw John Laurinaitis' face in front of me."

"I was sick and tired of them micro-managing our company, and now I've got to clear an angle past a f-cking guy in the amateur class that hasn't even made it to the roster?" Cornette said. "So when he said 'Nobody told me,' I responded by saying, 'Well did I tell you I was going to do this?' And I slapped the sh-t out of him."

>I gotta be honest, I might not have should've slapped him

According to Santino, Jim would later find out that he had neck surgery done and left him a voice mail:

"I check my message, and it's 'Santino, this is Jim Cornette. I heard you had neck surgery and you can't wrestle anymore! Well I'm here to tell you that I couldn't be happier that you can't wrestle anymore cause you never deserved to be in there,' and I'm literally with the bandage on, and I'm thinking, this guy's leaving a message like that when I just came out of surgery, what a piece of sh-t, like a genuine piece of sh-t."

Cornette doesn't deny that the voicemail ever happened, but he says he has no recollection of doing it.

Santino brushed it all off and would years later try to bury the hatchet with Cornette when he met him at a convention. It did no go well:

As it turned out, Carelli was leaving the bathroom when he crossed paths with Cornette, who appeared to be by himself — though a video surfacing of the incident proved otherwise. Carelli said he offered a handshake to call a truce, but Cornette ran him down verbally before going in to accept the handshake, anyway.  Cornette recounted what he said to Carelli on an episode of the "Jim Cornette Experience" shortly thereafter.

"I was miserable, so you did me a favor, but you didn't mean to do me a favor," Cornette recalls saying. "You were a jabroni in the beginner's class calling the office to get heat on me, stooging, to get a spot. So you didn't mean to do me a favor, so I can't give you credit for, it so we don't have anything to talk about. I shook your hand, we're done." Carelli backs that story up, but says he no longer had any interest in shaking hands.

Jim got ejected from the convection for this altercation:

Also lmao Jim got so mad he looks like Brother Love

But they did ask him to come right back.

He did not go back.

Grooming Accusations

Jim and his wife Stacy [Syn}. Behold the fate that awaits all manlets

In case you missed Santino screaming male feminist at Jim:

In 2020, former Ohio Valley Wrestling wrestler Phil Earley accused Jim and his wife Stacy of grooming him:

https://www.wrestlinginc.com/news/2020/06/jim-cornette-responds-to-allegations-made-against-he-and-671609

I made a very vague post yesterday about @TheJimCornette. In the face of current events I feel the need to clarify and speak up.

"During my first year in the business, his wife, Stacy, attempted to groom me. She approached via DM, sent me lewd photos I never asked for, implied protection from the Kentucky commission (stating he was a family friend), and told me she WAS going to f–k me, as if I didn't have a choice. My experience with them is tame compared to others, though When Jim was booking at OVW, if you wanted a contract or on his show, you HAD to perform sexual acts on his wife, many times with him watching. This has happened for many, MANY people. A close friend of mine was groomed and basically brainwashed by them for YEARS.

"When he finally escaped, Stacy went to great lengths to not only terrorize him, but to actively try to have other wrestlers physically assault him. I was one of them. She sent me pictures show tires of his he's slashed, and bragging about setting him up to lose his job, his apartment, even his car. All because he escaped an extremely toxic relationship and didn't want anything to do with them. Stacy bragged about being able to call the Kentucky commission to give him 'targets'. He was a family friend, and if she wanted, she could turn his attention to anyone licensed in the state to potentially hurt, and sometimes even ruin their careers.

"When he says 'cult of cornette', it's because he has a history of taking advantage of greenhorns using his power and position as booker for OVW in order to fufill his and his wife's sexual desires. They used their place of power to hurt many, many people. No one wants to speak up because of his position in wrestling, but this is EXTREMELY common knowledge among OVW alumni. This will probably ruin a lot of opportunities in wrestling, and that's fine, but make no mistake: Jim Cornette is trash. He and his wife have made power plays in order to hurt many, many people.

"f–k you Jim. f–k you Stacy. You are scum."

>When he finally escaped

Dude makes it sound like Jim's got a literal s*x dungeon.

Earley further tweeted:

"I just feel like I betrayed the school that let me learn the craft of professional wrestling. OVW is the reason I turned my life around. And I feel like I've betrayed them. That's how messed up wrestling can be. My hands are shaking and I'm scared s–tless over typing this."

Another literal who wrestler Mike Braddock from OVW backed up Earley in a tweet:

The proof is everyone that has worked with Jim and Synn at OVW has experienced it in some way themselves. They attempted it with me.

Earley apparently included a "racey photo" that Stacey sent him but the tweet is now deleted and brother I am not looking up this foid's booty photos.

Jim responds to the accusations:

https://x.com/TheJimCornette/status/1273942905242243072

Morning all--I know that my name has to be involved in everything because it gets attention, but I'm too busy running a pizza parlor from the basement of my p-dophile ring to make any twitter goofs and their 700 fake accounts famous today.

Jim's not taking the accusations lightly:

https://x.com/TheJimCornette/status/1273943286399541253

Helpful hint: I have been told that when you're faking screenshots of something that "happened" years ago, you shouldn't use the person's profile picture that's only been up a week and a half. It's the little things, but that's for attorneys to discuss.

Jim would further shoot down the accusations on his podcast:

https://www.wrestlinginc.com/news/2020/06/jim-cornette-discusses-the-sexual-conduct-allegations-made-671829

I ain't joking with you, from the professionals in the wrestling industry that have been in our hot tub that we've had for fifteen years, I'd say 5-6 tops. And I don't remember any of them being contracted at the time to any major organizations," Jim continued. "That's what I'm saying – if you take out the manipulating people's jobs accusation, which we've just basically drawn and quartered, as they say, and illustrated it was f–king caca. What you've got left is I've been charged with having an interesting s*x life.

The TL:DR gist of it is that Jim and Stacy are swingers. Maybe Stacy sent Earley booty pics and he told her didn't like it and assumed he didn't get a career push because of it? Maybe Earley took up Jim's and Stacy's "hot tub" offer and now regrets it? We don't know. It's also been 3/4 years since the accusations from Earley and Braddock came forward and nothing's come from it nor has anyone else from OVW or anywhere else come forward with more grooming accusations. Personally I don't think Jim's a groomer, he has a disgusting s*x life, but not a groomer.

The Time He Tried To Murder His Promotion Rival

I tried not to include any drama where it's just Jim telling stories on his podcast because there's a 50000 word limit but I wanted to include this one because it's r-slured and funny.

On his podcast Jim nonchalantly talked about trying to murder Terry Landell:

I was wondering if there was any truth to the story of you trying to run over Terry Landell with your car back in the day?

Yes this is a crime I will admit to because I've already gone to court and you can't-it's double jeopardy-I was trying to kill the motherlover.

Islamophobic Rant

A day after the November 2015 Paris attacks, Jim would go on a rant on his podcast blaming Islam for the attacks.

https://www.cagesideseats.com/cageside-seats-features/2015/12/19/10625820/jim-cornettes-islamophobic-views-have-no-place-in-wrestling

Jim claimed Muslims "bomb the frick out of shit" and argued that if you were to ban any speech it should be Islam because it

blatantly hinges on [the belief that] people should be killed, stoned to death, mutilated, castrated, beheaded or otherwise eliminated for a variety of shit that nobody should give a shit about to begin with.

Three weeks after the Paris attacks an Aussie Muslim sent Jim a later letting him know that Islam is a religion of peace, This caused Jim to go on an even longer rant on his podcast:

But let me tell you something peepeeface after you have gone off on that promo, let me tell you a few things. Number one of which I'll admit that the people running the United States are a really fricked up bunch of people, however, you think it's bad, [if] those fricking dalmatian eating fricking psychopaths that run your fricking countries over there [got] a hold of the U.S.'s resources and you'll see what would happen. The whole fricking Earth would be blown up in six fricking weeks, because your people are a bunch of goddarn lunatics and here's why motherlover. The Americans are psychopaths? We're fricking amateurs. Here's what you ought to do just before we even get into the meat of the matter, what you ought to do is you ought to put a fricking kibosh on those street celebrations you have where 20,000 of ya are out on the fricking street wearing some shitty clothes that look like they haven't been washed in fricking six weeks with goats firing off automatic weapons up in the air celebrating with the fricking burning fricking George Bush effigies and death to America banners. We know George Bush was a goddarn idiot, but you know what, we also don't really burn people in a fricking street around here for real even if he deserved it, which he did, and you people do, so don't try to tell me about this peaceful fricking Islamic religion when all you see from these goddarn backward butt cave-fricking people's countries are goddarn people burning other people in the streets and throwing them off goddarn roofs, first of all....

But with the Muslims you're not even safe in fricking Disneyland, so as far as I'm concerned the Muslims have lost the right to be indignant when people knock them or their religion or look at them sideways or like they're scared because when a large number of those people are fricking nuts and regardless of what this guy says what you hear on television or you read in the newspapers and magazines and the things that these religious leaders call [for], the fatwahs on people, and they fricking shoot people for cartoons, if your religion calls for a lot of fricked up things to happen to women or gay people and or anybody that tells you that your God is fictitious and you are easily egged on by all those other religions with their fictitious versions of God telling you your God is fictitious, which they all are by the way, so the only way to get even is to blow up a bunch of people you don't know. No, I'm not onboard with your shit their pal....

You can't go out and discriminate against or be violent to anybody just because a bunch of their fricking people but not all do bad things, but you can have a group of people who lose their right to be surprised or offended or indignant when they don't like them or look sideways at them or talk bad about them because their group is involved with so many bullshit fricking incidents in so many places over so long a period of fricking time. The fricking Scientologists may not be there yet, but the Muslims are. And once again, memo Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, [if they didn't] look like a goddarn bunch of fricking, you know, nutcases, Ayatollah Who The Frick and all the goddarn maniacs with all the automatic rifles with the death to America banners, and have a bunch of people jumping up and down screaming like cave people on acid it would help your fricking public relations.

Yes, and I realise the United States has been fricked up but it doesn't matter even when we get a goddarn guy named Barack Obama in the White House as the leader of the free world and still you think the fricking West is on a goddarn war against Islam? We're in a war against Islam because you keep blowing shit up, motherlover. So anyway shooting strangers with an AK-47 or blowing up a nightclub in Paris because you're pissed off that you got the wrong end of the stick religiously or politically is not the way that normal people solve their problems and you want to fricking defend your goddarn religion? If it wasn't for this religion, this particular religion, all of these stories are fictitious and made up, there is no invisible, supernatural supreme being, all the stories are bullshit, but yours is the one that people are killing people over, so it's the one I'm going to like the least and there's nothing that you can really do about that because the team that I play for, the atheists, don't fricking kill anybody or blow anybody up, so don't be sending me emails telling me that I need to modify my opinion, motherlover. How about a large order of fish heads for you? That's my response to you, I don't give a shit.

I thought about condensing the rant down but goddang it's just pure boomer rage and it should be read in it's entirely. Also I wanted to see what the word filter would do to the rant

The fallout from Jim's rant was immediate: Jim's co-host Alice Radley left the podcast over Jim's remarks, she didn't know shit about wrasslin but she got a purdy voice and the host that Jim then used for his podcasts, MLW Radio, would issue an apology:

Following the comments made on the Jim Cornette Experience, we here at MLW felt it was important to clarify the position of MLW Radio: Like every podcast, the views, opinions and positions expressed by Jim Cornette are his alone, and do not reflect the views, opinions or positions of MLW or anyone involved with the podcasts. We strongly support freedom of speech but equally, tolerance and acceptance of all faiths, ethnicity, race, sexual preference or otherwise. There are many at MLW Radio who have friends that are Muslim and have seen the hardships they've had to endure as a result of Islamophobia. It is our goal to find peace in this through understanding and acceptance of others and we will work to do so in this case

Jim himself would later cuck out apologize for the rant:

https://x.com/TheJimCornette/status/678686193677180928

I support @MLW's statement, have sent them one of my own. My whole show is designed to "offend" people, but not REALLY offend--I apologize.

I would like to add to MLW's earlier statement concerning controversy over my recent podcast. The very nature of my show and it's appeal is that I issue opinions that people feel very strongly about, either positively or negatively. I have been especially pointed toward all religions, and although most of those rants are meant and taken with a comedy slant, this one may have crossed over from entertaining and into hateful or mean-spirited, and for that I apologize.

Even on this issue the listeners have been widely divided, but if I truly offended ANY of the listeners, I'm sorry.

My New Years' Resolution is to talk about more positive things, I just need some help in finding them.

The real irony here is that Jim is an honorary Black Muslim:

I love wrestling so much.

What's Ol' Jim Up To These Days?

Jim's retired from the wrasslin bidness but he keeps himself pretty busy.

Jim makes appearances in the odd wresting related documentaries along with a plethora of wresting interviews. Look up anything related to wrestling and there a good chance that Jim has talked about it in an interview. Jim has also appeared in all four seasons of the Dark Side Of The Ring series. Jim also runs two podcasts: His wresting podcast The Jim Cornette Experience and his shooting the breeze podcast the Jim Cornette Drive-Thru.

Jim podcasts are surprisingly popular, the Cornette Experience coming in at #6 in the wresting category on Apple Podcasts. If you ever need a giggle you can read the podcasts reviews from seetheing AEW smarks:

And of course, Jim has his own website where he sells comic books and action figures of himself.

Not only that but for $15 you can join the Cult Of Cornette and it comes with "10 all-purpose Thank You, Frick You, Bye business cards with JC's photo on the back--guaranteed to make enemies of even your closest friends!".

Recommended Viewing

Jim's 1997 RAW shoot promos:

>Hulk Hogan is a household word, but so is garbage! And it stinks when it gets old too!

Goddarn that's brutal

Jim and Jerry Lawer invade ECW:

Fun fact: That was a real nutshot Tommy Dreamer took at the 4:10 mark. He blacked out from the pain and had to be taken to the hospital to get the blood drained from his swollen balls.

Jim discovers anime dating sims:

Jim recalls the Ox Baker Cleveland Riot:

Jim falls and busts his bussy

Jim reviews the Undertaker's cameos:

Some mark paid $1000 for the Undertaker to thank him for being a good husband HAHAAHAHAHAHA

AUSTRALIAN WOMEN BEHAVING BADLY

Also known as Down Under, Australia is the smallest continent, and it consists of three countries, namely: Papua New Guinea, New Zealand, and Australia. Today, we will discuss three Australian women who were naughty and brought shame to themselves. Before we dive in, I think it would be necessary to give a little background regarding the Australian continent.

Papua New Guinea

When the continent is discussed, Papua New Guinea is often neglected, so it would be wise to discuss this interesting country briefly. The islands of Papua and New Guinea were discovered by the Western world in the sixteenth century by Portuguese and Spanish explorers. In 1884, Germany took control of about a quarter of the islands, calling it German New Guinea, and plantations were established. In the same year, Britain claimed control of the Southern coast of New Guinea and called it British New Guinea. It was established as a protectorate, though ownership of this protectorate would be passed to the Australian Commonwealth in 1902.

Australia forcibly seized German New Guinea during World War 1, and during the Pacific War, the Allies defended the territory from Japanese invasion until Japan surrendered in 1945. Following this, Papua and New Guinea would be merged to form what was known as The Territory of Papua and New Guinea. While it operated as a single body, it was still under the control of the Australian government. In 1975, the territory freed itself from Western control and became an independent State.

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country consisting primarily of the North Island and the South Island, as well as over 700 smaller islands. It is regarded as one of the last land masses that humans settled on.

It is believed that it was found by Kope, a Polynesian explorer, in the 14th century. The Polynesians settled here, eventually forming what would become the Maori tribe. The Maori's way of life was disrupted when European colonialism began. In the 17th century, Abel Tasman the British explorer discovered New Zealand, and not long after it was fully mapped by James Cook in the 18th century. Conflict arose, resulting in large swaths of Maori land being seized by British colonizers.

Today, New Zealand is part of the Commonwealth, and large strides have been taken to restore the dignity and wealth of the Maori. The country is also noted for being one of the first in the world to give women the right to vote.

Australia

Today, of course, we'll be discussing Australia. Its colonial history is a long and brutal one with effects that permeate into the modern day. With the arrival of the First Fleet on the island in 1788, Europeans were confronted with a strange land that they often did not understand or appreciate.

Europeans viewed the Australian land and people as ancient, primitive, and endemically resistant to progress. Such judgments reflected the Europeans' confused and defensive reaction to ecology and a way of living in a land very different from their own. This reaction allowed the Europeans to legitimize their colonization by casting themselves as superior to the ‘savage' Aborigines.

Their failure to appreciate the Aborigines' knowledge is evident in the Europeans' responses to fire. Although many early observers recognized that the Aborigines set fire to the land, they were at a loss to understand why and certainly did not see it as a crucial land management practice. Such an unthinking dismissal of an ancient practice is characteristic of the Europeans' views of the Aborigines as uncivilized and backward.

With the contextualization out of the way, we can begin our discussion on the three women. We'll be looking at what they did, what the public reaction was, and how the women reacted to the consequences of their actions. The three women are:

• Mel Greig

• Belle Gibson

• Raina Thaiday

Without further ado, let's begin.

Mel Greig

Born in 1982, Mel Greig is no stranger to the media. In 2011, she participated in the Australian version of The Amazing Race, and she has also written for publications such as Yahoo Be.

In 2012, she began co-hosting the Hot30 Countdown on 2Day FM with Matty Acton, and then Mike Christian. This job wouldn't last for long. In December of the same year, she and her co-hosts decided to pull a prank. You see, at the time, Catherine Middleton, Princess of Wales, was in hospital in London. This was big news, and plenty of New Zealanders were sending their best wishes to the princess.

Mel and Mike pretended to be the king and queen, and they phoned the hospital, asking about Catherine. The phone was picked up by Jacintha Saldanha, a nurse at King Edward VII Hospital. Jacintha fell for the joke and even proceeded to forward them to the nurse who was taking care of Catherine. You can listen to the whole thing here:

Personally, I can't see how not one but two women fell for that. Jacintha was mortified when she discovered she had been bamboozled. Unable to face the humiliation, she committed suicide and left a note stating that the prank was the reason she did it.

The suicide caused a great backlash, and advertisers began boycotting the radio station. Mel was subjected to online bullying and hate mail which, in a strange turn of events, made her suicidal. Mel has taken responsibility for her role in the prank, and she has publicly expressed her regret at ever doing it.

I think she is an otherwise good person, and it was just an unlucky string of events that led to her being named in a suicide letter.

Belle Gibson

Belle Gibson was born in 1991, and by all accounts, she had a normal childhood. In her teen years, she picked up skateboarding, but that didn't last long. It is believed she dropped out of school in Year 10.

In 2013, Belle publicly claimed to have cancer. Not just cancer, but multiple cancers, including brain cancer and blood, spleen, uterine, liver, and kidney cancer. Shocking many, she claimed that she was shunning conventional medicine and treating herself through healthy eating.

Encouraging others to take the same route, she released an app called The Whole Pantry which outlined healthy eating for people with cancer. She also released a cookbook of the same name. Forever generous, Belle Gibson also claimed that a percentage of the proceeds would be going to charity. Her health claims continued, and she stated that she has had multiple heart surgeries and that she once suffered a stroke.

Of course, this couldn't continue indefinitely. Eventually, journ*lists began sniffing around and realized that Belle was lying a lot. Eventually, it was unearthed that she had never had cancer. She bamboozled people with a sob story to get them to buy her book. She also gave false hope to cancer patients and quite possibly turned them off conventional medicine.

Since the uncovering of her lie, Belle has been publicly shamed, and she received a hefty fine for making false claims about donating to charity. She has not paid these fines, which has led to her house being raided at least twice. She now claims that she is part of the Omoro tribe, though the tribe has denied this.

I think she's cute, and she should be forgiven.

Raina Thaiday

Despite the extent of this tragedy, there is very little information available on it. Raina Thaiday was a woman known to have schizophrenia. Despite this, she had at least nine children, and she lived with them, along with her neice and her child, in a single home. Her first child she gave birth to when she was 14.

Her oldest daughter, Norena Warrena, has described Raina as a very loving mother who was close to all her children. She was also a chronic marijuana user, which did not do favors for her mental health.

In December 2014, she had a schizophrenic episode that started with her killing the family duck and cleaning the house obsessively for a week to rid it of evil. A dove told her to kill her children, which she did. She killed 7 of them and a niece. The youngest victim was 2 and the oldest was 14. Her weapon of choice? A knife which she used to slash all the children in the home before she turned it on herself and stabbed herself 35 times.

She did not die, and after hospitalization, made a full recovery. She was put on trial for the murders, but it was found that she was not of sound mind when the murders occurred. Hence, she was taken to a mental healthcare facility instead, where she resides to this day.

CONCLUSION

Thanks for reading. Writing these is a nice distraction from the horrors of life as a poor incel. Sometimes I get so lonely it physically hurts. Tune in next time when we discuss the best Oprah episodes.

WARNING: THE FOLLOWING IS FILLED WITH MAJOR CHUD DRAMA.

Context: Byfron, an anti-cheat/tamper development company, was acquired by Roblox. A few months after the acquisition, Roblox added Hyperion, Byfron's anti-tamper software, into the Roblox client. Since the addition, people have tried their best to bypass it, such as changing their client channel, using a different client, blocking HTTP requests, etc. But alas, after a few months, Roblox has finished rolling out Hyperion, and every exploit has cut communications ever since... until now.

Terms Used:

Time-Zone - CST

UWP - If UWP is mentioned, the thing in question is about the Universal Windows Platform version of Roblox. Notable for not having Hyperion within the first few months of the roll-out. Most UWP exploits are free, as it's easy to develop an exploit for UWP.

Comet - Small Roblox Exploit, gained popularity after developing the UWP version

Electron - Small Roblox Exploit, became the #1 UWP exploit after being one of the first ones to migrate

Script-Ware - 2nd Most Popular Paid Roblox exploit

V3rmillion (Vermillion) - Largest Roblox Forum

What Exploits Are Online - Site that tracks the status of various exploits

Synapse Softworks LLC - Security Company notable for developing Synapse X

Synapse X - #1 Most Popular Paid Roblox Exploit, developed by Synapse Softworks LLC

3dsboy08 - One of the owners of Synapse Softworks LLC

Unified Naming Convention - Lua scripting API, made to unify all coding APIs into one easy-to-use API

Synapse V3 - 3rd version of Synapse, originally intended to replace X after Hyperion gets fully rolled out

The following will be in chronological order

8/19/2023 (estimated) - Unknown Time

The UNC website goes down. Nobody knows why, and nobody bats an eye.

9/11/2023 - Unknown Time

Comet shuts down unexpectedly. Nobody knows why. The statement is a long yap session that announces that they're branching off into different projects.

Various Dates - Various Times

Various other smaller UWP executors shut down. One of the largest ones, Electron, completely nukes their Groomercord for a bit. People theorize Roblox is sending out C&Ds.

Various Dates - Various Times

Various "Hyperion bypasses" come into fruition and are sold on various ro-exploiting forums. All of these turn out to be scams. Some major "bypasses" include Virdium, Astrid X, and Nebula (all these links require login sadly).

10/21/2023 - 6:17 PM

Script-Ware owner arqez, after leaving SW buyers with 0 information since Hyperion finished rolling out, announces that a status update will be given about SW.

Please refrain from DM'ing staff about the current status of Script-Ware. As mentioned above, Script-Ware is undergoing maintenance just like the majority of all other (high-quality) exploits due to the countermeasures that Roblox released to prevent exploits from fully functioning and operating.

A seperate statement will be released in the future. Hold tight for now!

Many people theorize that this will finally be some good news and a Hyperion bypass will finally be released.

9/27/2023 - 7:29 PM

3dsboy08 requests ownership of the /r/SynapseX subreddit.

https://old.reddit.com/r/redditrequest/comments/16u12d2/comment/k2ie492?context=8

10/23/2023 - 3:02 PM

V3rmillion owner seg unexpectedly announces the site's future shutdown.

https://v3rmillion.net/showthread.php (requires account to view)

Dear Users & Friends,

Verm started as a small project between friends nearly 12 years ago (making it older than a number of you!), and while we never anticipated it would grow to the size it did, it meant a lot to us for a long time. Unfortunately, as we grew older, we found ourselves with less and less time to dedicate to the site, and we were unable to keep it running at the level of quality we wanted.

Last year, we attempted to hand the site over to a new team to continue its operation, a process that we anticipated taking up to a year. Unfortunately, for various reasons, this did not work out. While we could have explored other options, it can be very hard to balance the needs of a community, the safety and protection of user data, and the partiality of future owners. We need to move on with our lives, and we're not prepared to compromise on any of these things. The only course of action we're comfortable with moving forward is to shut the site down.

As part of our next steps, we'll be offering the domain up to sale. Assuming the domain is sold, the site and all user data will then be deleted, not sold. The official Groomercord will be archived and public access will be removed, but if there's a strong community preference for completely deleting the official Groomercord for the sake of protecting user data, this is also on the table.

We encourage you to create a new (or use an existing), community run Groomercord server, and if we're happy with how it's managed and think it is a safe place to direct our users, we will be happy to link to it from the site. We will not, however, link to any community run sites that are created, as we can't be confident about user safety and data safety on these sites.

If you're genuine and serious about buying the domain, please PM me with your offer (in £GBP) with some form of proof of funds (I may respond asking for more details). We will only be accepting BTC, ETH, XMR, or LTC for this deal. I'll update this announcement with the highest legitimate offer when we see something we can accept. Our soft deadline for this is the 13th of November.

Thanks for being a part of what we built here. We're sorry we couldn't keep the site running, we're sorry we couldn't find a way to keep it running in the future, and we're sorry it's come down to a cash figure on the domain. We're grateful for the community we've had over the years, and we hope you all find a new home to call your own.

seg

After the announcement, ro-chuds are in SHAMBLES. Everyone starts raiding the forums as the shutdown date looms closer. I can't find any archives, but it was mostly comprised of text wall spam, Roblox porn, scat porn, gay porn, cp, and (fake) doxxes of owners/admins. People start their exodus into other forums, such as the WRD Forum, subreddits such as /r/robloxhackers, and revival projects such as Vermillion II (which is ironic cause the v3 in v3rmillion stands for version 3 of vermillion). People start panicking as seg is known to have insider info related to Roblox exploits, and V3rmillion shutting down could only mean that shit is about to go down.

10/24/23 - Unknown Time

Seg edits his post to add further context. He receives an offer of $15,000 for the website and addresses various concerns about how user data will be handled. He says that there is currently no plan to sell user data alongside the sale of the site, but gives the idea of selling "anonymized data" of the users to the lucky purchaser. This causes panic, as the idea of selling any data is a terrible idea to think of.

https://v3rmillion.net/showthread.php (requires account to view)

Update On Current Offer 24/10/2023

It's been a day since I posted this announcement, and the current highest for the domain with proof of funds provided is $15,000 USD. (~£12,330). Please note, we cannot analyse proof of funds in fine detail, and it is possible for people to forge screenshots of their crypto wallets. The person who has made this particular offer has spent money with v3rm before on the ad system, so there is at least some additional credibility to their offer.

Additionally, I've had many queries from interested parties about buying the whole site, with its the domain and all data. As stated in this announcement, this is not something that the admin team currently has an appetite to offer. That said, I've spoken with the admin team about possible alternatives, and if those parties are interested in purchasing (in addition to the domain) a heavily anonymised version of the database to try to revive the site in the future, we will consider their proposals. Such a database would only contain publicly visible posts & threads (and the uid of users who posted them), and would contain very few fields of user data (uid, username, & hashed email. Not passwords.)

10/24/2023 - 12:05 PM

Babyhamsta, the owner of WEAO, announces the death of WhatExploitsAre.Online a day after the death of V3rmillion.

(@)everyone Hi everyone, I hope you've had a great past few months. I know there has been a lot of changes on ROBLOX and in this community since December of 2021. Since then WEAO has grown to support many new status and has blown up to over 15k members from the 1-2k we started with. I can't express how appreciative I am for the support on this project.

With that being said I have decided to look into closing the doors on this project, main reason being the reduced amount of traction in the community. Obviously I am not the only person who has been affected by this as the most popular forum for ROBLOX is now closing as well. WEAO went from about 50-80 million requests a month to around 1-4 million after Byfron was introduced. This can give you a rough idea on how it potentially affected V3rmillion as well.

This project was something I wanted to do to help bring the community together and to allow people to share knowledge, scripts, and of course chat about their use cases with the products WEAO tracks statuses on.

I have funded WEAO out of pocket since day one and I personally don't want to continue to fund it further with how things are going. I've personally spent over $1,000 hosting and funding WEAO not including advertisements when it first started or all my time developing WEAO.

I also made the hard decision to not pass WEAO off to anyone, I was originally going to make WEAO open source once I decided to stop the project but I am not sure if I'll even do that. If I do I may redact quite a few things to prevent developer's endpoints from being leaked.

Again I am so thankful you've joined me here on WEAO and I wish you all the best of luck in the future. Currently no steps will be taken until the V3RM forum is offically shutdown, once that has taken place WEAO will follow shortly after.

Thank you all for the years of support!

• Hamsta

After this announcement, people get even more suspicious, as WEAO is going down at the same time as V3rmillion. Could it really be over?

WARNING: FIRST MENTION OF REAL (sadly minor) CHUD DRAMA

10/23/2023 - 3:02 PM

Louka, a Synapse affiliate, replies to seg's post with the following:

https://v3rmillion.net/showthread.php#pid8543467 (requires account to view)

Everything comes to an end, including V3rmillion. The only thing that does not come to an end is the unending love of Jesus Christ.

If you're now stuck without something to visit, you should start with your church. If you've spent all this time exploiting to fill your empty life with temporary passions, you need to pray and seek meaning in the Lord. If you haven't touched any grass in all this time, I can verily say to you that the best grass is found on church grounds.

It has helped me, it will help you. Here are some resources to get started, but if you feel like your life needs change and a plunge is necessary then find your nearest parish and start going to church. Contact a priest and ask questions. It has changed my life and it will change yours.

https://www.goarch.org/-/the-church

https://www.oca.org/questions/teaching/s...-christian

Various V3rm users end up mocking Louka for this. "God isnt real", "go frick yourself", and various other insults are spewed at Louka from a specific demographic within V3rm.

10/27/23 - Various Times

All of Synapse X's socials including Groomercord, Twitter, Status Site, and Telegram are deleted, and everyone is confused. A few minutes later, the Synapse X website is updated with the following information:

https://x.synapse.to

Let's cut to the chase: we will no longer continue offering Synapse X. We have shut down the software's services as of this announcement, and all user data has been deleted.

As important Synapse X was for the growth and credence of our company, it became clear that we must expand our horizons and move on. In light of this new direction, we have decided to sunset Synapse X and begin work on more ambitious projects. We are currently working on many very exciting things, which we hope to showcase soon. For now, you can learn more about our recent undertaking here: https://devforum.roblox.com/t/exploit-prevention-update/2663101

We want to thank our users for their support and understanding throughout the years. It really has been a pleasure to serve you all. We are thrilled about what the future holds for us, and we hope that you will continue to follow our journey.

Sincerely,

The Synapse team.

Along with that, a Roblox security representative Bitdancer announces that Synapse has partnered with Roblox to help with platform security.

Hi folks,

What happens when an immovable object meets an unstoppable force? They work together.

As made clear by what we said at RDC 2023, cheating and exploiting are not welcome on our platform, and we are using every measure within our power to combat it. This should have been evident with our last ban wave, in which we banned hundreds of thousands of players. Ban waves will continue until morale improves, but we are certainly prepared to take more drastic steps whenever necessary.

To take another step towards this goal, we are pleased and excited to share that we have entered into a close partnership with Synapse Softworks LLC. Synapse is well-known in the reverse engineering scene. Over the years, the folks at Synapse have proven time and again their deep understanding of the security problem space, and their work is regarded as some of the best, if not the best, in the field.

It might seem strange that we're teaming up with Synapse, but we believe it will be the most fruitful option when it comes to reinforcing the platform's security. For the longest time, we've been on opposite sides of the battlefield, but in time we've grown to respect their skills, and they've grown to respect our vision. Our goal has always been to make Roblox the most trusted, safe, and fair environment possible, and with Synapse in the fold, we're one step closer to achieving this goal.

Having said all that, we do welcome reform. We are always interested in working with anyone who will help us make Roblox a safer and more fair platform. As part of this, we encourage people to share any relevant information with us through our Bug Bounty program 2.6k.

As for Synapse, they will work together with Roblox in analyzing security issues and developing countermeasures. We couldn't have hoped for a better partner, and we are looking forward to finally working together on the same side.

Thank you!

After this, shit goes completely down. 3dsboy08 (owner of Synapse) has already been in past drama within the exploiting community. He decided not to switch to UNC for an unknown reason, and people theorize that it's because he makes exclusive deals with script developers to develop scripts using only the Synapse API. He swept a critical RCE in Synapse X under the rug for 3 months and banned anyone who talked about it. He also decided to change Synapse V3 to a $8 monthly sub (before selling out). There are also rumors that he's Jewish, which also contributes to the mocking he's getting.

The exploiting community gets furious, as he basically sold out to Roblox. Everyone is concerned about their data, as they don't want to be banned from Roblox. People begin to harass 3dsboy08 and even successfully dox him.

Random argument I found within that thread

10/27/23 - 2:56 PM

Script-Ware owner AzuLX comes out with a statement announcing the death of Script-Ware. The website and authentication servers are taken down after the announcement.

(@)everyone Seven years ago I joined this community and created my first ever project. This project over the next two years turned into Script-Ware, which over the next two years after that became Script-Ware V2 - a product (made with an awesome, new team) that enabled me to make great friends and have the biggest community and userbase I have ever seen in my life. 37,000+ users later, introducing UNC, and countless updates, projects and more - it's sad to say that we're at our end.

All user data has been permanently wiped from our servers and we've deactivated our services permanently. After 3 years of Script-Ware, it's time for us to move onto a new chapter in our lives when it comes to engineering software.

This server will remain up and running as more of a community haven and chill spot over a product groomercord server. I want to let each of you know that from us, we are grateful for you all, especially the ones that have been here since the start, publicly supported our work and more. Each time I would receive a DM or ping from someone letting me know that they love what we've made and enjoy an update we put out, it made me feel great. I can speak on behalf of my entire team that we will never forget how awesome it was to maintain and develop Script-Ware for you guys.

Finally, I wanted to also congratulate Synapse (https://x.synapse.to) on their new venture with Roblox as a company, and I wish them the absolute best. Having worked with some members in their team and having known them across all seven years of being in this community, it really makes me happy seeing their growth and success.

We'll see you around!

(:)ScriptWareRainbow(:)

This isn't met with as much negative reception as the death of Synapse. The only complaints were that customers are entitled to a refund, to which owner arqez released a statement at 10:45 that same day:

As per our TOS and EULA, we reserve the right to discontinue at any time, without the need of having to issue refunds to customers. We understand that you may be disappointed, but we are physically not able to issue you refunds as all of our systems have been permanently suspended & user data has been wiped.

Maybe in the forseeable future there will be some compensation for previous Script-Ware customers in some shape or form, but nor are we legally bound to do so, or know if that will happen. Sorry!

if anything looks sloppy, that's mostly because i made this at 11:00 at night and took a nap half-way. i'll try to remember to update this with the latest information, but please leave an upmarsey as this is a major effortpost (mostly because most of the post is filled with quotes). might also incorporate some more marseys in the future Now enjoy some random fighting within these servers.

MURDER MOMS

https://rdrama.net/post/214932/can-you-count-to-8-part

As we all know, women rarely kill. When they do, their children are sometimes the victims. In such cases, the act is sometimes attributed to postpartum depression. This is a psychological condition that arises shortly after the birth of a child. Currently, we don't know exactly what causes postpartum depression. It is believed that it may be the product of drastic hormonal changes that occur post-pregnancy. The condition isn't entirely biological, however, and there are social factors that seem to worsen the condition. For instance, ensuring a mother is adequately supported is vital. The drastic lifestyle changes can lead to mental breakdowns, so helping to keep some kind of normalcy for the mother is important.

Interestingly, it is worth noting that men are also at risk of developing the condition. It is not entirely known why this is. It has been suggested that male hormones change when they are around a pregnant partner, while others argue that the causes are sociological.

Those suffering from postpartum depression feel empty and struggle to connect with their child. In severe cases, postpartum psychosis will develop. The sufferer will experience a complete break from reality, which puts their children at risk. Research suggests that in the USA, postpartum depression is one of the leading causes of infanticide. Postpartum depression can be treated, but we need to remove the stigma around the condition.

Today, we're going to look at women who killed 4 or more children, as well as their motives.

4. Tonya Thomas

Deaths: 4

Motive: Unknown (possibly revenge or mercy killing of children)

Tonya Thomas was a mother of four living in Florida. The children's father, Joe Johnson, was very abusive to Tonya, and the children reported several instances of watching their mother get beaten. They were fond of their mother, and they reported that she was never verbally or physically abusive to them.

An aside on domestic abuse

Abuse often isn't about the immediate moment. Being the victim of violence or emotional abuse, it hurts in the moment, but that's not what makes it so awful. The insidiousness of abuse lies with its long, seemingly endless tail. When the perpetrator is gone you continue to be haunted by their ghost. It's a ghost that taunts you with every demeaning word you've ever heard, chills your skin with the zap of neverending anxiety, and clouds your vision with images of the past

Abuse never ends. Not even when you've escaped those who harm you. Like cinnamon dying the hands of a field worker, you will forever smell them, see them, and feel them on your skin. Some of us are meant to be victimized. That is the net total of our existence, and we don't overcome it because we cannot overcome it.

So what is the end product of domestic abuse? Most of the time, a shattered person. Think about how many women an abusive man traumatize in a single lifetime? How many tears a single mean girl will cause in a year?

End

Tonya wanted out of her situation, but she didn't know how to escape. She had no money to leave her husband, and she could not support her children if she ran away with them. She would not dare to leave the kids with their father, nor did she want them to be subjected to the broken foster care system. Out of desperation, Tonya did the unthinkable.

On May 15, 2012, Tonya (now 33. made a drastic decision. First, she sent a friend a text stating that she would like to be cremated with her children. The friend did not see the text in time. At this point, her offspring were quite old, with the youngest, Joel Johnson, being 12. Jazzlyn Johnson was 13 and Pebbles Johnson was 17. Jaxs Johnson is 15 and he also physically abused Tonya, almost certainly acting out what he had seen his father do several times. At one point, Tonya phoned the police on Jaxs, complaining that he was kicking and punching her when she woke him up for school.

Tonya was home alone with her kids and she started day drinking. Was this intentional? Did she want to give herself courage for what she was about to do? We'll never know. Anyway, she took her Taurus .38-caliber revolver and loaded it with bullets. To this day, all her friends and family say they had no idea she had a gun, and police have been unable to trace where she obtained it from.

Then the rampage began. She called all her kids indoors and then began shooting at them. Some managed to flee and beg neighbors for help. This is when the story gets twisted. Neighbors, upon seeing distressed kids on their front door crying about their mom shooting them, decided to keep the door closed and told them they wouldn't be let indoors before they phoned the police. One man WAS EVEN ARMED and he called the police and told them that he wasn't going outside nor was he going to let the children in.

Tonya grabbed all the children and took them back to her house where they were executed. She then sat on her porch smoking a cigarette before turning the gun on herself.

Quite frankly I don't know what I would have done. However, this case does highlight that patriarchy can have positive aspects to it. Most notably, traditional masculinity is expected to be protective over women and children. In a patriarchal society, a man would never dream of dishonoring his family by hiding as children are shot. If not to protect children - the most innocent among us - then what is the gun for?!

5. Geneviève Lhermitte

Deaths: 5

Motive: Revenge, Mental illness

For once, we're not in the USA. Instead, we're heading to Belgium to look at the case of Geneviève Lhermitte. She was born in November 1966, worked as a teacher, and was married to Bouchaib Moqadem. Though they loved each other, Bouchaib could be violent and abuse at times.

Geneviève had her first child, Yasmine in 1992 and her second child, Nora, in 1995. It was around this time she started suffering from postpartum depression. In most cases, women who develop postpartum depression are advised to stop having babies. With every subsequent birth, the depression gets worse and could eventually develop into postpartum psychosis.

Eventually, Geneviève was unable to work, which left the family somewhat financially constrained. This was worsened by the fact that they lived in the apartment of a physician named Michel Schaar, and Geneviève believed he was taking the intimacy out of her marriage. As is the case with most marriages, all these stresses caused them to argue more, though they still managed to have three more children. If only Geneviève had stopped having babies...

In February 2017, the unthinkable happened. Geneviève went to the supermarket and stole two kitchen knives. She then returned home where her children were watching Spy Kids 3. Her husband was away on a trip. First, she called her youngest daughter, Mina, to a separate room. There, she began strangling Mina until her face went purple. She isn't the first killer mother to realize that strangling isn't easy, and it takes a long time. Eventually, when she realized Mina wouldn't die, she used a knife to slit the little girl's throat.

Next up was Medhi, who was the only son. He was also called aside and strangled before having his throat slit. Three kids left. The next child, Myriam, was told there was a surprise in mommy's work office. Once in there, she was blindfolded. The poor child was expecting a treat. Instead, Geneviève hit her over the head with a marble plaque before slitting her throat. Geneviève then called Nora in a different room and told her to sit in the chair. When the child sat, Geneviève slit her throat from behind.

The last child, Yasmine, was the oldest so she would be the most difficult to kill, Geneviève predicted. She was correct. Though Geneviève was able to lure her into her office, Yasmine figured out what was going on and fought her mother. Unfortunately, she was overpowered and murdered. Imagine the sheer horror of battling your own mother to the death. She collected all the children's bodies (except for Nora) and put them in bed. Some of them were given teddy bears. What happened to Nora? Well, Geneviève put her body in Schaar's bathroom. She would later confess that she did that to hurt the physician.

With all the killing done, Geneviève realised that it was her turn next. Like MANY of the mothers here, her suicide attempt failed. She was arrested and put on trial for five counts of infanticide. She received the maximum sentence despite arguing insanity. This year, she was euthanized.

I found this case interesting because there is so little information on it in English. Makes it very hard to research. You'd think a case like this would be more publicly known.

6. Megan Huntsman

Deaths: 6

Motive: Unwanted children

In 1996, Megan Huntsman was going through hard times. She and her husband had three children already and not a lot of money. Megan was also an alcoholic and meth user who struggled to keep her life together. It is reported that her husband Darren West was abusive toward her.

That year, she realised things would be getting worse when she fell pregnant. Unlike many other women, Megan did not show when she was pregnant, so she was able to hide the pregnancy, but she didn't want the baby. So, she gave birth in isolation, suffocated the baby to death, then wrapped the baby in cloth, put it in a box, and hid it in the garage. Nobody even knew she had fallen pregnant.

This is vile enough to do once. Megan would do it 5 more times over the next decade. This means she was killing a baby roughly once every two years. Her method of choice was strangulation, and sometimes she would use a hair tie. She had a seventh baby, though it was stillborn. Nevertheless, she disposed of it the same way.

The murders only stopped when, in 2014, her now ex-husband went to the house to pick up some of his possessions in the garage. While digging through the mess, he discovered a little box and opened it to find a dead baby inside. Appalled, he alerted the authorities who rushed over, saw the horror, then arrested Megan. At the police station, she claimed that she had a stillborn baby and didn't know what to do with the body so she decided to hide it. As she was explaining this, another call came to tell them that another box had been found. Then another. You know the rest.

DNA tests were done and it was determined that Megan's husband was the father of them all. He had no idea he had impregnated her 7 times (10 if you count the alive kids). Megan was put on trial for the six infanticides. She pleaded guilty, stating the following:

"Depression and alcohol took hold of me the same way drugs did," she said. "I cannot give a reasonable answer why I was capable of such a sick and heinous crime. I held my secret for 18 years."

"In some small way, I wanted to help them avoid the terrible life I would have given them," she said. "I deprived my little babies of the opportunity of life."

The police working on the case were highly traumatized, as they had the misfortune of having to handle infant corpses, many of which were years old. They were wrapped in cloth and plastic, sometimes with electrical tape to tie it shut. Megan's daughters testified that their mother was loving and caring. They were shocked to discover that she was a serial killer of babies.

Two of Huntsman's daughters submitted letters on their mother's behalf, describing her as a loving parent who had done a good job caring for them rather than a cold killer as some see her.

"Nobody could guess my mom would do anything like this," they wrote. "No matter what anyone thinks you are, you are a good person."

Megan Huntsman's youngest sister, Jamie Huntsman, wept as she read the letters, then went on to give her own statement. Her sister had always been loving, but timid.

"Megan is not a monster," Jamie Huntsman said. "She's not evil. From what I understand, she was scared."

Megan is currently serving a life sentence for the six murders. It's worth noting that in her first confession, Megan stated she had killed eight or nine children. Therefore, there could be dead babies that have not been found yet.

Do you think she is a bad person? Do you sympathize with her situation? Is the murder of a newborn worse than the murder of a grown adult comprehending what is happening to them?

7. Lucy Letby

Deaths: 7

Motive: Sadism, God complex

Born in 1990, Lucy Letby grew up in Herefordshire where she was studious and loved by her teachers. From a young age, she wanted to be a nurse. Her inspiration? She had a difficult birth, and it was the nurses who saved her life.

Pursuing her dream, Lucy attended the University of Chester where she studied nursing before she began working as a neonatal nurse at Countess of Chester Hospital in 2012. A lot of nurses avoid neonatal care. You're dealing with sick children, and it can take an emotional toll on you. Lucy, on the other hand, specifically wanted to work with children in the emergency unit.

In June 2015, the weird deaths began. She was looking after a little boy when his heart suddenly started beating erratically. She called staff, and the doctors attempted to save the child who died shortly afterwards. A day later, the boy's twin also met a sudden death during Lucy's shift. She would kill a further two more babies in June alone. Lucy wasn't just killing these children. She was mourning with the families, sending them condolence cards, and stalking them on Facebook. It was as though she was feeding off their grief. It's also worth noting that she enjoyed targeting twins and triplets.

Her method of murder was to typically inject air into the baby's bloodstream. Sometimes, she would inject a child with high levels of insulin. It wasn't like the hospital didn't notice the sudden deaths. They were strange and they were being investigated. However, nobody suspected little quiet Lucy Letby. She didn't always get it right. One child was injected with air and lived, but now has brain damage.

Lucy made her final error in 2016 when she was looking after a child who was in the neonatal ward but wasn't really sick. The perfectly healthy child, under Lucy's care, suddenly died on the 23 of June 2016. The doctors were especially suspicious of this death, because there was nothing wrong with the baby prior. An x-ray was done on the baby and it was found that the baby had an abnormal amount of gas in his body. A little later, the baby's triplet also fell ill and died shortly after. He too was found with an abnormal amount of gas. The mother, mortified, took her last triplet to a different hospital.

These were the deaths that rang the alarm bell. Lucy was taken off her post and put in a different position as an investigation took place. At the end of the investigation, she is charged with 7 counts of murder and 10 counts of attempted murder. This makes her a serial killer. A serial killer of babies. Does a male version of this even exist?

Lucy was put on trial this year. During this time, we got to hear from some of the parents who had some interesting things to say about Lucy.

• Lucy bathed deceased babies

• she took pictures of the babies and pictures of the cards she sent to grieving parents

• "Lucy Letby and another nurse asked me if I wanted to bathe my baby. While we were bathing her, Lucy came back in. She was smiling and kept going on about how she was present at the first bath and how our daughter had loved it. I wished that she would just stop talking"

• On the afternoon of 22 June 2016, following a holiday in Ibiza, she texted a friend: "Probably be back in with a bang lol". Child O died the next day.

During the trial, she wrote a note confessing to the crimes and describing herself as evil.

Lucy was found guilty and is currently serving a life sentence. Her parents still profess her innocence, refusing to believe that she could be one of Britains worst serial killers. We don't know her motives, although it is believed that she liked the feeling of deciding who lived or died. What do you think?

CONCLUSION

Tune in for part 3 when we discuss the last mother who killed a disgusting number of babies.

ACCUSED OF KILLING BABIES

In the following two cases, we have women who have been accused of ending the lives of children. In both cases, the women were found guilty, though their cases continue to be hotly debated. It is up to you to decide whether the evidence points to guilt or innocence.

Amanda Lewis

Amanda Lewis was a mother of two living in Florida. Her life was never easy, and she had already lived through the loss of one child. She had a son named AJ and a daughter named Adrianna. It was known that Amanda had a tough time raising her children, especially Adrianna who had ADHD and could be a handful.

On August 8, 2007, Amanda was indoors while the two children played in the backyard. There was a raised pool in the backyard that was too tall for the children to climb into.

Suddenly, AJ ran into the house telling Amanda that Adrianna is in the pool. Frantic, she runs outside and finds her daughter face down in the pool. She drags the child out and tries CPR while phoning the police.

Unfortunately, when emergency services arrive, there isn't much they can do and Adrianna is declared dead. Drownings happen all the time, plus there was a toy truck found next to the pool which seemed to explain how the child got in (used the truck as a step). Things took an unexpected turn when AJ started talking to his grandparents.

According to AJ, his mother's story isn't true. He claims Amanda was angry with Adrianna and wanted to punish her for spraying glass cleaner all over the house. So Amanda held Adrianna by the face and repeatedly dunked her in the pool until she drowned. Alarmed, the grandparents called the police, and the boy was interviewed.

What ensued next was one of the most important trials of the century, as a 6 year old's testimony would determine whether a woman would go to jail for murder. There are several factors that make Amanda look guilty. First, there's the testimony from the boy. Children lie, but this wasn't a normal kind of lie. Secondly, hand marks were found on Adrianna's face which squares up with AJ claiming the child was held by the face. Lastly, the home revealed that the children may have been abused or neglected. It was dirty, smelled of urine, and there were no toys for the children to play with.

There is also evidence in Amanda's favor. She did a polygraph test and passed it when asked about Adrianna's death. Secondly, AJ's story never remained consistent. Sometimes it would change and dip into fantasy, with AJ claiming he had a gun and shot at his mom. Other times, he would claim Adrianna told him to dial 911 while her head was underwater. So how much weight can you give a 6 year old's testimony? Lastly, Amanda was offered a 10 year plea deal. She refused, claiming she was innocent.

There was a long trial where AJ was called to testify. It's kinda sad because he cries when he sees his mom. Amanda was found guilty. She is still in prison today, professing her innocence. She never saw her son again after seeing him in the courtroom. Did she kill Adrianna? Is AJ lying? How does AJ feel about all of this now?

Emily Defries

Emily Defries was a young woman with one child when she met Mr Belle, who had two daughters named Anna Belle and Emily Belle. They moved in together, which Emily liked because it meant the children could play together more.

One day, Emily was home with the three children. As far as she knew, 20 month old Anna was asleep while her two children were playing in their room. When she walked indoors, she gasped when she discovered Anna unresponsive at the bottom of the stairs. She called the police but when they arrived, they declared her dead.

An autopsy was done, and it was discovered that the child did not die from falling down the stairs. She had extremely severe injuries including a long gash on her back, a fractured skull, a bleeding stomach, and a broken arm. Emily was arrested, and she was accused of killing Anna. Emily denied this, claiming she had never hurt any child. Shockingly, she blames the older sister who is 8 years old.

In court, the defense argued that all the bruises and injuries were caused by the rambunctious 8-year-old. The big sister did have a history of being emotionally explosive, but you have to remember just how severe the injuries are. The big sister was questioned in court, but she answered "I don't know" to most questions. The prosecutors claimed that Emily hated Anna because she didn't want Emily to marry her dad. Furthermore, relatives stated that they had never seen bruises on Anna until Emily entered the picture.

Emily is found guilty of second-degree murder. Like Amanda, she was offered a plea deal which she declined. Emily still professes her innocence. So where do you like? Did Emily do it, or was it the big sister?

CONCLUSION

As you read this cases, consider how many drowning cases may have been frustrated mothers who got tired of their children. Though these women are wicked, we should acknowledge that mothers are often asked to do the impossible, and they sometimes fail.

Tune in next time when we discuss Lucy Letby.

Men are violent. There's no denying it. It is estimated that men commit 98% of all murders globally. What's interesting to note is that of all female homicide victims, 10% were killed by strangers. In contrast, 70% of male homicide victims are killed by strangers. It seems like men are facing random violence while women are being checked by the people in their lives.

What about that 2%? Who are these outliers and why do they do what they do? To explore this question, I wish to look at mothers who killed their children. We will discuss their motive and the events that led to the tragic event. With every subsequent entry, the death toll increases by one.

1. Julissa Thaler

Deaths: 1

Motive: Revenge

Julissa Thaler has always been a thrill-seeker. She started drinking at 13 and was abusing prescription drugs in her early twenties, resulting in her going in and out of treatment facilities. At one point, she used LSD on a daily basis.

Julissa had a son, Eli Hart, with a man named Tony Hart. Their relationship had been a tumultuous one which featured Julissa making insane accusations against Tony. Additionally, Julissa used drugs during her pregnancy. Eli was born with Townes-Brocks syndrome, a disease that affects several of his organs. Consequently, he wears hearing aids.

Tony, who had worked to get his life together and was married to another woman, was fighting to gain custody of Eli. This was hard because, despite being gainfully employed and a responsible citizen, the mother's custody rights take precedence. Julissa, who was spiteful, also didn't want Tony to have the child and she did everything she could to prevent him from seeing Eli.

In 2019, she accused Tony of making a homemade bomb. Though no such bomb was found, that was enough to have a restraining order filed against him, essentially barring him from seeing his son at all, as she had managed to gain 100% custody.

When Eli was with Julissa, she wouldn't bathe him or clothe him, and the child would wind up with cuts and matted hair because it was never combed. Child Protection Services eventually visited her home, found in complete disarray, and took the child away from her. Julissa was sent to a mental healthcare facility.

At this point, you'd think Tony would finally have his son? No. He was given to Nikita and Stephen Konenberg, who were relatives of Julissa. Still, the father fought to see his son and gain custody. When Julissa was back on the streets, it was up to the courts to determine who Eli would be given to. Julissa regained custody. When she parked outside Nikita's house with binoculars in the early hours of the morning, Nikita called the police. Consequently, Julissa was given Eli two days earlier. The father still did not have custody.

As part of having Eli back in her care, Julissa was ordered to take parenting classes. She did not. At school, Eli complained that his mommy was hurting him. A teacher reported it to CPS. Julissa did not lose custody and she explicitly told CPS that Tony will never see his son.

On May 20, Julissa put her son (now 6. in the backseat of the car and drove to a secluded area. Due to his disabilities, he sat in a car seat. She then pulled out a shotgun and shot Eli 9 times, having to reload the gun. By the end of her carnage, her back window had been blown out, and the car interior was covered in blood. She then took the car seat containing whatever was left of Eli and put it into the backseat.

During her drive home, she is pulled over by the police. In addition to the smashed window, one of her front tires is missing. They speak to Julissa and they realize that she has brain splatter in her hair, she's covered in blood, and there are shotgun shells littered all over her car. She manages to convince the police that it's deer meat, so they decide to give her a ride home! Some of the police stay by the car. They're still suspicious of the whole thing, so they decide to open the trunk. In there, they find the horrific mess Julissa made.

She is arrested, and is given life without the possibility of parole. At sentencing, the judge asks if she has anything she wants to say. She does: “I'm innocent. Frick you all. You're garbage.” When the judge is reading the sentencing, she tells him to speak up because she can't hear him over his stomach grumbling.

The saddest part of this case is how preventable it was. I didn't even go through everything CPS overlooked or just didn't give a shit about when they kept giving the baby back to her.

https://www.kare11.com/article/news/investigations/kare-11-investigates-eli-hart-child-red-protection-failures/89-a0878e1a-f655-48bc-96ce-b25114aef1ac

2. Christy Sheats

Deaths: 2

Motive: Revenge

Christy Sheats was married to Jason Sheats. They were a relatively wealthy family in Texas, and they had two daughters. Madison was 17 and she was a straight-A student. Taylor was 22 and in college.

Christy and Jason were fighting all the time, and this had been going on for years. Furthermore, Christy wasn't particularly mentally stable, and she had attempted suicide three times. Eventually, Jason realized he could not handle things anymore. He told Christy that he was going to divorce. Men, if you're going to divorce your wife, leave with the kids first. An abuse victim is most at risk when they want to leave the relationship.

On June 24, 2016, Christy spoke to her husband and reminded him that they hadn't told the girls about the divorce. Jason agreed that they should do it. So Christy called for a family meeting. After the family gathered together, they turned to Christy, expecting her to speak. Instead, she pulled out a .38-caliber revolver and shot Taylor in the chest.

At this point, Jason is utterly horrified and Madison is screaming. Jason tells Madison to run and call the police as she shields Taylor amd tries to escape with her. Madison flees and manages to call 911, and she's soon joined by Taylor and Jason who are still desperately begging her to not shoot them. She shoots Madison in the back and she dies on the porch.

The calls are available online, but be warned they are absolutely harrowing one of the worst things I've heard so don't listen unless you want to hear a 17yo scream “MOMMY DON'T SHOOT ME” before getting shot as a husband howls in the background.

Jason and Taylor make it onto the street where they're also calling 911. Once again, the audio is disturbing beyond belief. Jason is begging Christy, telling her he'll do anything if she puts the gun down. She does not put the gun down. Instead, she went back inside to reload before returning to shoot Taylor again. Police arrive on the scene, but this doesn't deter her. She shoots Taylor a third time. She is ordered to put the gun down and she does not comply, resulting in police opening fire on her and killing her.

Christy did not shoot Jason. Not one hair on him was harmed. That was intentional. She wanted to hurt Jason and absolutely psychologically shatter him. Did I mention that it was also his birthday?

3. Lauren Peepeeason

Deaths: 3

Motive: Unwanted children and possibly revenge

Lauren Peepeeason grew up wealthy in South Africa. Thanks to her brains as well as her money, she was able to study medicine and become a doctor. In 2005, she met Graham Peepeeason, an orthopaedic surgeon, in Pretoria, and before long the two married.

Peepeeason is described as an intelligent woman, though she could be rude at times. She was very sociable and had a big friend group. She also had a long history of depression.

She and Graham wanted to have children, but it was proving to be harder than anticipated. Consequently, they ended up relying on IVF and donor eggs. Liané, her first child, was born in 2014. Not long after, she had twin girls, Maya and Karly in 2018.

Peepeeason was happy to be a parent, but it wouldn't be true to say she loved every aspect of it. The kids were a handful, and according to Peepeeason, they would regularly kick and slap her and (taking a note from Bella and Cece Watts) throw chicken nuggets at her. In contrast, they loved their father, which angered Peepeeason.

She would regularly complain about her kids to her friends, and some of the texts are truly horrific. She says the children are never enough, that she wants to murder them, and that she regrets becoming a mother. She also expresses rage when the children favor their father. She confided in her husband that she had thoughts of harming and killing her children, and he gets her on antidepressants.

Though life was good for the wealthy Peepeeasons, they did not like South Africa for a myriad of reasons, including the high crime rate, social unrest, and the government's declining ability to provide electricity to its citizens.

During the lockdowns of 2020, Peepeeason's mental health steeply declined. This is in part due to how strict the lockdown restrictions in South Africa are. Eventually, Graham and his wife decided they had had enough of South Africa, so they moved to New Zealand. Before they left, Graham found 3 cable ties linked together in the closet but thought nothing of it.

They arrived in New Zealand and to their astonishment, Peepeeason's condition did not improve. She hated Timaru and felt that they had made a mistake by moving. A much bigger mistake was coming.

On 16 September 2021, Peepeeason went to go pick up her children from school. First, she had to get Karla. As usual, she threw a fit in the car, frustrating Peepeeason. After picking up the other children, they visited the park for a while before returning home. Graham had a prior engagement with some work buddies, leaving Lauren alone with the kids. They were particularly boisterous and cantankerous that evening, jumping on the couches and disrespecting Peepeeason.

Peepeeason told her children that they were going to make special necklaces. She gave them the cable ties and tied them around their necks. With that done, she began strangling the kids one by one. She started with Karla who she admitted had been particularly mean to her that evening. Liané, who was 7 at the time, was old enough to know what was going on and began pleading with her mother. According to Peepeeason, she “very angry and she wants to know why I'm doing this to them because I'm the best mum and she loves me.”

All three children were strangled, though it took some smothering as well to ensure they were truly dead. She then made a few pathetic attempts at suicide before swallowing some pills. Graham returned to a house of horror. Following the deaths, he would move back to South Africa while Peepeeason stood trial in New Zealand.

In court, Peepeeason argued insanity, and there was some basis for this, as she had suffered from postpartum depression. Prosecutors painted a different picture. They claimed that Peepeeason was tired of her children, and she was jealous of the fact that they preferred her father. She regularly sent friends texts about killing her kids and how annoying she found them to be. In August 2023, Peepeeason was found guilty, and she is currently awaiting sentencing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_the_Dickason_children

CONCLUSION

In part 2, we'll continue our count from 4. Alan Wake 2 review tomorrow. Bye :)