Daily Archives: June 15, 2022

Former South African President Nelson Mandela on May 16, 2005 (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

A nationally known candidate for governor is slammed for days in the media when she appeared without a face mask in front of a group of masked school children, despite her strong, widely known public support for mask-wearing during the COVID pandemic. She made a mistake. A brilliant, visionary CEO is shunned for months after he admits to having had a consensual sexual relationship with a co-worker several years earlier. He made a mistake. In anger over a dispute concerning a deeply held view of his, a U.S. Senator inadvertently used a smutty word and was roundly criticized for weeks. He made a mistake.

This is a time of divisiveness, an era when the slightest blunder triggers strong censure, often far exceeding the gravity of the misstep. The view that "to err is human" has been replaced with "to err is a frontal assault on my sensibilities." Too many people stay on the lookout for "got you" moments that present an opportunity to vent anger and register scorn. Extreme political correctness has bulldozed any efforts at a basic human understanding of intent. There seems to be little room for an honest mistake.

There are grave consequences for a judgment-laden culture, especially in the business world. It is a risk-averse world that jettisons innovation and growth to the sidelines. The more energy is devoted to protecting and defending, the less there is for exploring and learning. In the end, self-righteousness trumps effectiveness; intolerance eclipses acknowledgement. And courageous compassion becomes too rarely invoked. This is the time to rekindle the power of forgiveness. Here are three ways to use forgiveness to reclaim an atmosphere of patience and kindness.

1. Forgive the Person in the Mirror

Archbishop Desmond Tutu frequently speaks of the power of forgiveness. "Forgiveness is like this: a room can be dark because you have closed the windows, you've closed the curtains. But the sun is shining outside, and the air is fresh outside. In order to get that fresh air, you have to get up and open the window and draw the curtains apart." Frozen movie character Elsa's hit song "Let It Go" is about self-forgiveness. The lyrics plead, "It's time to see what I can do; to test the limits and breakthrough."

Forgiveness starts with self. "Life becomes easier when you learn to accept an apology you never got," wrote author Robert Brault in his book Round Up the Usual Subjects. In the words of actor Matthew Jeffers, "The only disability in life is a bad attitude." A self-forgiving attitude starts with the recognition that humans are all amazing miracles. An infectious, self-forgiving attitude changes the universe around us. "To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you," wrote theologian Lewis Smedes.

2. Be the Rising Tide

I served for several years on the faculty of Marriott's Executive Education Programa week-long residential learning experience held quarterly for high potential general managers. One class was held right after Marriott had acquired hotel properties from Whitbread Hotels, a U.K. hospitality company. The cultural personalities of Whitbread and Marriott could not have been more different. That reality surfaced loudly during an animated discussion in a morning class. The Whitbread general manager aimed a sarcastic, biting tease point-blank at a Marriott GM. The entire class went silent for an uncomfortably long time. You could tell the Whitbread GM was confused at the reaction to his comment, one wholly appropriate in the more acerbic British culture in which he lived and worked.

Three Marriott GMs pulled the Whitbread GM aside at the first break. I could overhear bits and pieces of their assertive conversation. The bottom-line message was clearwe do not speak to one another in a judgmental, ruthless, or sarcastic way. The Marriott culture is laced with an allegiance to thoughtfulness, compassion, and authenticity. Gamey conduct and one-upmanship are as unwelcome as trash in a hotel lobby.

3. Read External Anger as Internal Fear

Imagine you are a parent with a young child who awakens in the middle of the night frightened by a bad dream. The upset child comes into your bedroom. What would you do? The answer is easyyou would model bravery and confidence; you would carefully listen without judgment; and you would offer great empathy and understanding as you sought to calm and encourage. The principles used to deal with a frightened child are the same for all relationships when belligerent confrontation, sharp differences, and uproar are involved.

Occupy Wall Street protesters on May 1, 2012 (Photo by Monika Graff/Getty Images)

Anger is not a primary behavior; it is a secondary behavior. The primary behavior is fear. What we see on the outside might be fury, but what is going on in the mind of the angry person is a fear of being a victim. Victim could mean "I will look stupid," "I will lose control," or "You will win, and I will lose." Meeting anger with acceptance (forgiveness), humility and empathy invite your assailant out of their anger to greater understanding, resolution, and a wholesome relationship.

When a tiny airline, Stevens Air, discovered in 1990 that much larger Southwest Airlines was using its advertising tag line, "Plane Smart," they resorted to levity instead of litigation. The CEO of Stevens Air challenged the CEO of Southwest to an arm-wrestling contest to decide who would keep the clever tagline. No lawyers were involved. The fun-filled event in a rented wrestling arena turned into a major media hype for both companies, complete with cheerleading teams, bands, fanfare, and a physical contest that drug out the competition for a long time. And the result? Stevens Air won the match, kept the slogan, and experienced a 25% growth over the next four years.

Forgiveness begins with raising hands instead of pointing fingers. It means stepping out of your comfort zone to stand up for compassion and empathy. Start your forgiveness plan by sharing with colleagues your intent to forgive more and blame less. When you are about to censure or chastise, stop and consider there might be an alternative view worthy of your respect. Redirect your negative energy toward acceptance. When your resentment or bitterness wins out, regroup, redirect, and reaffirm your commitment to betterment. Life and work will become lighter, relationships stronger, and understanding deeper.

Read this article:

Reviving The Lost Art of Forgiveness - Forbes

Jesse Powell, a founder and the chief executive of Kraken, one of the worlds largest cryptocurrency exchanges, recently asked his employees, If you can identify as a sex, can you identify as a race or ethnicity?

He also questioned their use of preferred pronouns and led a discussion about who can refer to another person as the N word.

And he told workers that questions about womens intelligence and risk appetite compared with mens were not as settled as one might have initially thought.

In the process, Mr. Powell, a 41-year-old Bitcoin pioneer, ignited a culture war among his more than 3,000 workers, according to interviews with five Kraken employees, as well as internal documents, videos and chat logs reviewed by The New York Times. Some workers have openly challenged the chief executive for what they see as his hurtful comments. Others have accused him of fostering a hateful workplace and damaging their mental health. Dozens are considering quitting, said the employees, who did not want to speak publicly for fear of retaliation.

Corporate culture wars have abounded during the coronavirus pandemic as remote work, inequity and diversity have become central issues at workplaces. At Meta, which owns Facebook, restive employees have agitated over racial justice. At Netflix, employees protested the companys support for the comedian Dave Chappelle after he aired a special that was criticized as transphobic.

But rarely has such angst been actively stoked by the top boss. And even in the male-dominated cryptocurrency industry, which is known for a libertarian philosophy that promotes freewheeling speech, Mr. Powell has taken that ethos to an extreme.

His boundary pushing comes amid a deepening crypto downturn. On Tuesday, Coinbase, one of Krakens main competitors, said it was laying off 18 percent of its employees, following job cuts at Gemini and Crypto.com, two other crypto exchanges. Kraken which is valued at $11 billion, according to PitchBook is also grappling with the turbulence in the crypto market, as the price of Bitcoin has plunged to its lowest point since 2020.

Mr. Powells culture crusade, which has largely played out on Krakens Slack channels, may be part of a wider effort to push out workers who dont believe in the same values as the crypto industry is retrenching, the employees said.

This month, Mr. Powell unveiled a 31-page culture document outlining Krakens libertarian philosophical values and commitment to diversity of thought, and told employees in a meeting that he did not believe they should choose their own pronouns. The document and a recording of the meeting were obtained by The Times.

Those who disagreed could quit, Mr. Powell said, and opt into a program that would provide four months of pay if they affirmed that they would never work at Kraken again. Employees have until Monday to decide if they want to take part.

On Monday, Christina Yee, a Kraken executive, gave those on the fence a nudge, writing in a Slack post that the C.E.O., company, and culture are not going to change in a meaningful way.

If someone strongly dislikes or hates working here or thinks those here are hateful or have poor character, she said, work somewhere that doesnt disgust you.

After The Times contacted Kraken about its internal conversations, the company publicly posted an edited version of its culture document on Tuesday. In a statement, Alex Rapoport, a spokeswoman, said Kraken does not tolerate inappropriate discussions. She added that as the company more than doubled its work force in recent years, we felt the time was right to reinforce our mission and our values.

Mr. Powell and Ms. Yee did not respond to requests for comment. In a Twitter thread on Wednesday in anticipation of this article, Mr. Powell said that about 20 people were not on board with Krakens culture and that even though teams should have more input, he was way more studied on policy topics.

People get triggered by everything and cant conform to basic rules of honest debate, he wrote. Back to dictatorship.

The conflict at Kraken shows the difficulty of translating cryptos political ideologies to a modern workplace, said Finn Brunton, a technology studies professor at the University of California, Davis, who wrote a book in 2019 about the history of digital currencies. Many early Bitcoin proponents championed freedom of ideas and disdained government intrusion; more recently, some have rejected identity politics and calls for political correctness.

A lot of the big whales and big representatives now theyre trying to bury that history, Mr. Brunton said. The people who are left who really hold to that are feeling more embattled.

Mr. Powell, who attended California State University, Sacramento, started an online store in 2001 called Lewt, which sold virtual amulets and potions to gamers. A decade later, he embraced Bitcoin as an alternative to government-backed money.

In 2011, Mr. Powell worked on Mt. Gox, one of the first crypto exchanges, helping the company navigate a security issue. (Mt. Gox collapsed in 2014.)

Mr. Powell founded Kraken later in 2011 with Thanh Luu, who sits on the companys board. The start-up operates a crypto exchange where investors can trade digital assets. Kraken had its headquarters in San Francisco but is now a largely remote operation. It has raised funds from investors like Hummingbird Ventures and Tribe Capital.

As cryptocurrency prices skyrocketed in recent years, Kraken became the second-largest crypto exchange in the United States behind Coinbase, according to CoinMarketCap, an industry data tracker. Mr. Powell said last year that he was planning to take the company public.

He also insisted that some workers subscribe to Bitcoins philosophical underpinnings. We have this ideological purity test, Mr. Powell said about the companys hiring process on a 2018 crypto podcast. A test of whether youre kind of aligned with the vision of Bitcoin and crypto.

In 2019, former Kraken employees posted scathing comments about the company on Glassdoor, a website where workers write anonymous reviews of their employers.

Kraken is the perfect allegory for any utopian government ideal, one reviewer wrote. Great ideas in theory but in practice they end up very controlling, negative and mistrustful.

In response, Krakens parent company sued the anonymous reviewers and tried to force Glassdoor to reveal their identities. A court ordered Glassdoor to turn over some names.

On Glassdoor, Mr. Powell has a 96 percent approval rating. The site adds, This employer has taken legal action against reviewers.

At Kraken, Mr. Powell is part of a Slack group called trolling-999plus, according to messages viewed by The Times. The group is labeled and you thought 4chan was full of trolls, referring to the anonymous online message board known for hate speech and radicalizing some of the gunmen behind mass shootings.

In April, a Kraken employee posted a video internally on a different Slack group that set off the latest fracas. The video featured two women who said they preferred $100 in cash over a Bitcoin, which at the time cost more than $40,000. But this is how female brain works, the employee commented.

Mr. Powell chimed in. He said the debate over womens mental abilities was unsettled. Most American ladies have been brainwashed in modern times, he added on Slack, in an exchange viewed by The Times.

His comments fueled a furor.

For the person we look to for leadership and advocacy to joke about us being brainwashed in this context or make light of this situation is hurtful, wrote one female employee.

It isnt heartening to see your genders minds, capabilities, and preferences discussed like this, another wrote. Its incredibly othering and harmful to women.

Being offended is not being harmed, Mr. Powell responded. A discussion about science, biology, attempting to determine facts of the world cannot be harmful.

At a companywide meeting on June 1, Mr. Powell was discussing Krakens global footprint, with workers in 70 countries, when he veered to the topic of preferred pronouns. It was time for Kraken to control the language, he said on the video call.

Its just not practical to allow 3,000 people to customize their pronouns, he said.

That same day, he invited employees to join him in a Slack channel called debate-pronouns where he suggested that people use pronouns based not on their gender identity but their sex at birth, according to conversations seen by The Times. He shut down replies to the thread after it became contentious.

Mr. Powell reopened discussion on Slack the next day to ask why people couldnt choose their race or ethnicity. He later said the conversation was about who could use the N-word, which he noted wasnt a slur when used affectionately.

Mr. Powell also circulated the culture document, titled Kraken Culture Explained.

We Dont Forbid Offensiveness, read one section. Another said employees should show tolerance for diverse thinking; refrain from labeling comments as toxic, hateful, racist, x-phobic, unhelpful, etc.; and avoid censoring others.

It also explained that the company had eschewed vaccine requirements in the name of Krakenite bodily autonomy. In a section titled self-defense, it said that law-abiding citizens should be able to arm themselves.

You may need to regularly consider these crypto and libertarian values when making work decisions, it said.

In the edited version of the document that Kraken publicly posted, mentions of Covid-19 vaccinations and the companys belief in letting people arm themselves were omitted.

Those who disagreed with the document were encouraged to depart. At the June 1 meeting, Mr. Powell unveiled the Jet Ski Program, which the company has labeled a recommitment to its core values. Anyone who felt uncomfortable had two weeks to leave, with four months pay.

If you want to leave Kraken, read a memo about the program, we want it to feel like you are hopping on a jet ski and heading happily to your next adventure!

Kitty Bennett and Aimee Ortiz contributed research.

Read more from the original source:

Inside Krakens Culture War Stoked by Its C.E.O. - The New York Times

This is the second in a three-part series examining the major candidates running in New Yorks Democratic primary for governor. The first, on Jumaane Williams, can be read here. Primary Day is June 28.

Rep. Tom Suozzi has taken his share of grief in his long-shot effort to topple Gov. Hochul in the Democratic race for governor.

Suozzi, a centrist Long Island Democrat, has been told to stand down by Hillary Clinton and rejected by the state Democratic Party.

He has faced criticism over a series of perceived gaffes, including a declaration in a Penn Station news conference that the hub is scary, and a call with journalists in which he tied the Buffalo massacre to bail reform before clarifying that his preferred bail changes wouldnt have helped.

And without a clear lane against the relatively moderate Hochul, Suozzi has struggled to find major backers. His campaign website does not even bother listing his collection of endorsers.

Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.) (Bebeto Matthews/AP)

But to hear Suozzi tell it, his straight-talking commonsense campaign represents the last defense against electoral ruin for Democrats in the general election.

Everybody should look at the public polling that says that Kathy Hochul has a 37% job approval rating, Suozzi said, referencing an April Siena College survey that found 36% of New Yorkers viewed her performance as good or excellent.

So if the Democrats want to win in November, they should elect Tom Suozzi, because the Republicans cant beat me, he said. Because Ill win on Long Island. And because Im talking about what people care about, which is crime and taxes.

Hochul holds prodigious polling leads over Suozzi and the progressive in the primary race, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams. And whoever wins the race will hold a clear advantage in the general election: Democrats outnumber Republicans in New York by more than two to one.

[Jumaane Williams seeks to channel progressive energy in New York governors race]

But Suozzi, the former four-term mayor of Glen Cove, does have Long Island bona fides. And he has brought more than a little Long Island attitude to the Democratic primary.

Tom Suozzi speaks to a gathering of supporters during a rally outside the New York State Democratic Convention in Buffalo, N.Y., on Tuesday, May 30, 2006. (DON HEUPEL/AP)

While Williams has banked his campaign on progressive promises to enhance funding for social services, and Hochul has hoped voters will reward her work to drive back COVID, take on crime and tweak the 2019 bail reform law, Suozzi has served as the fearless attack dog in the race.

Suozzi lashes political correctness. He talks passionately about slashing taxes. He delivers lines like more money is not the answer to things.

In his ads and campaign literature, he hammers Hochul over crime rates that have climbed in her nine-month tenure, and for long-discarded support she once carried from the National Rifle Association.

Its a negative campaign, said Sid Davidoff, a longtime lobbyist and fixture in New York politics. I dont think that thats working today. She doesnt have an achilles heel that hes been able to find.

[Always aiming high: Friends, family, fellow pols recall incoming NY governor Kathy Hochul as determined, folksy and fierce]

But Suozzi said he is simply trying to hold Hochul accountable.

If people think Im being tough on Kathy Hochul, how do they think Lee Zeldin or Andrew Giuliani will treat Kathy Hochul? Suozzi said, referencing Republican primary candidates for governor. Kathy Hochul has not addressed crime. She has not addressed taxes. She has not helped our kids who are left behind.

His antidotes include a 10% cut to state income tax, an intensified rollback of the bail reform law and a push to transform the states office buildings into affordable housing.

The 59-year-old congressmans tone, more conservative than one might expect from a Democratic candidate in New York, can get him into trouble.

In April, one of his former campaign staffers, Matt Albert, wrote a column in the Daily News headlined, Im gay, and my old boss Tom Suozzi let me down, after the candidate said on a radio show that he thought Floridas so-called Dont Say Gay law was a very reasonable law.

Suozzi later described his remark as inartful and declared his opposition to the Florida law, which limits discussion of gender and sexual identity in Florida classrooms.

But his overarching argument beyond his PC-free persona is a claim that he would manage the state more ably than Hochul, and speak more directly to New Yorkers needs.

Things need to be run better, he told the Daily News. Im a lifelong Democrat. I have a heart for the people, but I use common sense and a skill set that Ive developed over a lifetime.

Rep. Tom Suozzi speaks on the floor of the House of Representatives at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on Thursday, April 23, 2020. (AP)

Suozzi grew up in Glen Cove, a suburb on the shore of the Long Island Sound about 25 miles from Midtown Manhattan.

His dad, an immigrant from Italy, served as mayor of Glen Cove, campaigned for John F. Kennedy during his 1960 presidential run and became a justice of the State Supreme Court.

The young Suozzi attended Boston College and Fordham Law School in the city. Along the way, he became enamored of former Gov. Mario Cuomo, perhaps planting the seeds of his own push for governor.

From 1993 to 2001, he served as Glen Cove mayor, and after that became the Nassau County executive, earning plaudits for his stewardship of the countys finances.

And then in 2006 he ran for governor. It did not go well. He lost in the Democratic primary by more than 60 percentage points to Eliot Spitzer, then the state attorney general. Suozzi did not even win on his home turf in Nassau County.

After his loss, Suozzi returned to Nassau and worked to rebuild his relationships in Albany, taking some time away from politics after losing a 2009 reelection bid for county executive to a Republican, Edward Mangano.

Tom Suozzi, a Democratic candidate for New York governor, addresses followers at a rally in Lafayette Square in Buffalo, N.Y., Tuesday, May 30, 2006. (ROBERT KIRKHAM/ASSOCIATED PRESS)

The gubernatorial dream simmered as Mario Cuomos son, Andrew, took the reins in Albany.

In 2016, when Rep. Steve Israel, a Democrat, decided to retire from the House seat representing Glen Cove, Suozzi took his shot and won. He bested a state senator, Jack Martins, by about six percentage points in the general election.

He has stayed in the seat since, but Mayor Adams attempted to woo him from Washington last year, offering him a deputy mayor post. Suozzi declined, setting his sights on the Executive Mansion and announcing his candidacy in November.

Hes always wanted to be governor, Davidoff said. Hes taking his best and probably last shot at something that he really wants.

But the state Democratic Party quickly consolidated its support behind Hochul. In February, at the state partys nomination convention in Manhattan, Suozzi said Clinton had tried to get him to drop from the race, telling him he was doing well in Congress.

He shrugged her off.

A lot of people have tried to talk me out of running, he told reporters covering the convention. Its been a big refrain.

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Long Island Rep. Tom Suozzi runs as a tax-slashing centrist in bid to topple Hochul in NY governor's race - New York Daily News

I definitely had a chip on my shoulder about the mainstream entertainment world not understanding Texas, Mike Judge says. His voice over the phone is thoughtful and unhurried, the opposite of his cartoon alter ids Beavis and Butt-Head, although theres no mistaking Butt-Heads zonked-out baritone lurking under Judges own. Theres even a hint of that laughthe needling huh-huh-huh that once drove so many parents and teachers crazywhich creeps in as the Austin writer and animator explains how he channeled his resentments into two of his most famous characters: a couple of teenage dirtbags who spend their days passing snickering judgment on pop culture from the pulpit of their couch. You just feel like youre not connected to show business, so why not make fun of it? Judge says. Theyre not going to welcome you in, anyway, so just sit there and take shots at it.

From 1993 to 1997, Judges Beavis and Butt-Head, which aired on MTV, didnt just make fun of showbiz. The little creeps were arguably the two most influential critics in America, capable of making a bandthey quintupledrecord sales for White Zombie, whose videos they deemed cooland stubbing out careers (sorry, Winger) with a point-blank this sucks. But their impact was felt beyond music. To their equally bored and alienated young viewers, Beavis and Butt-Head became the guttural voices of a generation. They mocked all manner of authority, defying the touchy-feely political correctness of the Clinton era and deflating pretentious phonies like a couple of paint-huffing Holden Caulfields. Theirs was an awesome power, wielded bluntly and fearlessly. And it all derived from the fact that, like their creator, Beavis and Butt-Head were outsiders with nothing to lose.

Judges most cherished cretins are back, returning June23 for a new movie, Beavis and Butt-Head Do the Universe, to be followed later this year by a fresh batch of episodes, all of which will stream exclusively on Paramount+. Judge has, of course, long since been lifted into that mainstream entertainment world he once so freely mocked. His movies Office Space and Idiocracy have become part of the pop culture lexicon. Two of his other TV series, King of the Hill and Silicon Valley, earned Judge the kind of critical esteem that few could have imagined back when Beavis and Butt-Head was being blamed for hastening the decline of Western civilization. But while Judge is no longer the scrappy underdog, he remains relatively unfettered.

For one thing, he still prefers to work from Austin, where he settled sometime after Beavis and Butt-Heads fourth season. It allows him to maintain a comfortable distance from coastal media bubbles, which feeds into his distinctive point of view on so-called flyover country. And when Beavis and Butt-Head return, Judge promises, their outlier perspective will be made even more specific: Theres all kinds of Texas references, he says. They even say their addresswhich, you know, doesnt exist. But Texas looms large in this new stuff.

Beavis and Butt-Head is rarely discussed as a Texas show, but its always been rooted here. Judge first developed its main characters while living on the outskirts of Richardson, about fifteen miles north of Dallas, in the early nineties. He was playing bass guitar for local bands at the time, including several years with blues legend Doyle Bramhall. But he was also taking graduate school classes in mathematics and contemplating a future as an actuary or community-college teacher. Judges showbiz aspirations seemed about as distant as North Texas is from Hollywood. Things changed when he attended a festival in Dallas and caught an animated short that had been created by a fellow local (though Judge is a little foggy on the details). He was inspired to buy a camera and try making his own cartoons, drawing everything by hand and doing all the voices himself.

One of Judges earliest efforts was a 1992 rough comic sketch about two chortling mouth-breathers who smack a frog around with a baseball bat. It caught the attention of MTV executives; by the very next year, Beavis and Butt-Head had premiered on the network and become an instant phenomenon. The show went on to spawn seven seasons plus a movie, 1996s Beavis and Butt-Head Do America, and a shopping malls worth of merchandise. Although he briefly relocated to New York City during the shows early years, Judge produced the bulk of Beavis and Butt-Head from Austin, including a brief, single-season revival in 2011.

Although that most recent reboot simply dumped the teenage Beavis and Butt-Head into the present day, fourteen years after they were last seen, without explanation, this new revival requires a bit more conceptual wrangling. Beavis and Butt-Head Do the Universe returns to 1998, where the boys shenanigans have landed them in front of a creative judge who sentences them to attend space camp. They soon blunder their way onto a space shuttle and find themselves pulled into a black hole (huh-huh) that spits them out into our present. Adding to the time-bending trippiness, Judge says, both the movie and future episodes will also catch up with paunchy, middle-aged versions of Beavis and Butt-Head. (It will make more sense after youve seen the movie, he promises.)

They mocked all manner of authority, defying the touchy-feely political correctness of the Clinton era and deflating pretentious phonies like a couple of paint-huffing Holden Caulfields.

Judge turns sixty this year, which he admits is partly why his eternal adolescents are finally being allowed to grow upphysically at least. For Judge, creating an older, if not exactly wiser, Beavis and Butt-Head has been particularly reinvigorating. I feel like if those episodes catch on, I could just keep doing those for a while, he says. But hes also had no problem tapping into his inner fifteen-year-old again. I was talking to Nancy Cartwright [who voices Bart Simpson], whos even older, playing a kid whos even younger, Judge says. I figured, Well, shes still doing it. Maybe I can get away with it. But its really more of a mindset.

Beavis and Butt-Heads bonehead worldview may be more or less unchanged, but its safe to say that the world theyre returning to isnt. Things have arguably never sucked moreand people today seem less disposed than ever to just laugh it off. It remains to be seen whether Beavis and Butt-Head can thrive in a climate where passionate sincerity has usurped ironic detachment and where most everyone has become far more guarded about the things they say and do. Newsweek wondered whether Beavis and Butt-Head can survive cancel culture. Nevertheless, Judge believes that the duos appeal remains both viscerally pure and timeless.

[South Park cocreator] Trey Parker said something once that I thought was a very high compliment, which is that Beavis and Butt-Head is like the bluesits the same old thing over and over again, but its still good, Judge says.

Besides, in the midst of such a fatally serious age, perhaps there is something to be said for retreating into juvenile mindlessnessif only for a little while. I tell Judge how I spent the early, panicky months of the COVID-19 pandemic rewatching old episodes of Beavis and Butt-Head, calmed not only by nostalgia but also by the shows giddy breed of nihilism. Nothing ever gets to Beavis and Butt-Head; no matter what disasters befall them, they remain narrowly, narcissistically focused on their desires for girls, TV, and nachos. Theres something oddly comforting about that, I say to Judge, particularly when our own world seems perpetually on the verge of falling apart. Judge replies that comforting is exactly what hed hoped his show would be. I felt like, for those reasons, maybe it was a good time to release something thats just fun to watch, he says, something about guys who are liberated by being completely stupid and therefore not really responsible for anything they say or do.

The characters lack of inhibition and stubborn, harebrained resilience have made Beavis and Butt-Head exceptionally enduring. These are also qualities that any Texan should recognizemaybe even admire. At long last, are we finally ready to claim Beavis and Butt-Head as our own?

Judge never meant for Beavis and Butt-Head to be Texans, exactly. In the beginning, he says, he envisioned their fictional hometown of Highland as an unspecified void somewhere between Lubbock and Clovis, vaguely nestled inside the overlapping plains of West Texas and eastern New Mexico. But during the production of Beavis and Butt-Head Do America, Judge explains, some background artist, without me seeing it, started putting Texas plates on the cars. So then I just gave in to saying, Okay, its Texas.

It made a certain amount of sense. Judge was born in Ecuador and raised in Albuquerque. His dad, an archaeologist, worked for Southern Methodist University and often traveled between Dallas and New Mexico. Judge spent a lot of time in Texas, he says, before eventually settling in Richardson in the late eighties.

And while Beavis and Butt-Head never wore its Texanness on its sleeve like King of the Hill did, there were subtle nods throughout that seemed as if they could only have come from someone who actually lived here. For example, the boys twice hire the ambulance-chasing lawyer Joe Adler, a thinly veiled parody of Houstons own Jim Adler. They torment a cowboy hatwearing redneck named Billy Bob, and they repeatedly fail to score with Lolita and Tanqueray, two trailer park vixens with flat Texas twangs. Beavis and Butt-Head also showed an obvious taste for Texas music, endorsing artists such as Butthole Surfers, MC 900 Ft.Jesus, Pantera, and the Reverend Horton Heat, which gave some of them their widest national exposure. And especially in those early episodes, the heat maintains a subtle yet pervasive presence, the sun baking the acres of untamed scrub that the boys wander through in their immutable attire of T-shirts and shorts.

Beavis and Butt-Head has a more spiritual connection to Texas too. The show premiered just a few years after Richard Linklaters Austin opus Slacker and a year before the Houston-set Reality Bites. These were films that, along with Beavis and Butt-Head, helped shape the Gen X psyche. Theyre populated with characters who are alienated, overstimulated young people who spend their days snarking on pop culture and trying very hard not to work. That they all happen to be Texans may at first seem incidental. Yet in many ways their disaffection can be tied to the land.

Beavis and Butt-Head live in a remote Texas sprawl, a suburban stretch of ranch houses and mini-marts surrounded by unincorporated dirt. Theyre restless and without purpose, and theyre bombarded by Hollywood fantasies that leave them feeling unfulfilled. Its a common theme that can be traced all the way back to 1971s The Last Picture Show. Who are Beavis and Butt-Head anyway but a crude distillation of that films Sonny and Duanejust two more bored, oversexed Texas teens delaying their dead-end futures while they stare at screens?

Oh, I like the sound of that, Judge says. I mean, I wouldnt put myself on the level of that movie, but I see the similarity. Albuquerque, on the outskirts, theres a similar feel to The Last Picture Show, where you can ride your bike to the end of the city, and then its just a vast nothing, going on and on. I always imagined [Highland] being a town like that.

Like a lot of classically Texan stories, Beavis and Butt-Head also deals with the modern worlds intrusion onand its corruption ofan old-fashioned way of life. Judge would go on to explore this subject more overtly in King of the Hill, whose protagonist, Hank Hill, battles the encroachment of hippies and hipsters into his small Texas town and frets over his own lazy, TV-fed adolescent son Bobby. But Hank also had an early prototype in Beavis and Butt-Heads Tom Anderson, another beer-drinking good ol boy who believes in honesty, hard work, and a well-kept lawn, I tell you whatall of which Beavis and Butt-Head gleefully, repeatedly trash. At one point, Judge says, he even considered having Hill be Andersons son, but Fox shot him down. Still, the two characters clearly share a philosophy and significancealong with an unmistakable drawl.

[Andersons] voice is based on a few different people that I knew in Albuquerque, and one of them was on the paper route I had growing up, Judge says. It just seemed like, when I was a kid, older people had Texas accents. The governor at the time, Bruce King, is from eastern New Mexico, and he sounded like a Texan. [That voice], to me, represented the older culture.

Theres a clear generational divide that separates Hank Hill and Tom Anderson from their teenage foils. But their beliefs and traditions are also entwined with a sense of place. Both Beavis and Butt-Head and King of the Hill deal, in their own ways, with the notion of cultural flatteninghow cable TV and the internet have chipped away at our regional identities, creating myriad Beavises, Butt-Heads, and Bobbys who are far more influenced by celebrities than by their own communities. In Beavis and Butt-Heads case, this disconnect has turned them into budding sociopaths, irreverent toward everything except Metallica and their own manic impulses.

On the other hand, they are also, as Judge points out, quite uninhibitedagain, perhaps this is the most Texan thing about them. Beavis and Butt-Head is ultimately a show about two characters with the freedom to behave however they wantand what a terrifying prospect that can be. Its a dangerous combination of too much time on your hands and teenagers exploding with hormones and being stupid, Judge says of the largely unsupervised world where the boys celebrate their autonomy by chainsawing grasshoppers and blowing up bowling balls. Thats the kind of wild self-rule youre most likely to find in a vast, rolling nothing like Highland, Texas.

Doubtless there are some Tom Anderson types who would prefer that Texas not lay claim to Beavis and Butt-Headparticularly if they, like the astronomer Carl Sagan once wrote, believe that the shows popularity heralds the incipient dumbing down of America. During its initial run, after all, Judges series was often treated less as a mildly transgressive work of satire than as some collective moral failing, denounced by parents groups and U.S. senators alike. Even MTV tried distancing itself, appending a disclaimer to early episodes that the show was completely made up by this Texas guy who we hardly even know, as if that explained it. Yet regardless of whether you find them hilarious or horrifying or comforting, as Judge himself points out, Beavis and Butt-Head have long embodied the same maverick independence that has always distinguished this place.

Everybody here is the descendant of people who moved to Texas because they were escaping something, and that spirit of just going somewhere to do your own thing is still lingering around, Judge says. Its the defiance of the outsider, and it lives on in Beavis and Butt-Head. And while you definitely shouldnt try their antics at home, theres nothing wrong with reveling in themor at least laughing at them. To believe otherwise would be antithetical to everything Texas holds dear. Put another way: it would totally suck.

This article originally appeared in the July 2022 issue ofTexas Monthlywith the headline Deep in the Heart of Beavis.Subscribe today.

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Deep in the Heart of Beavis & Butt-Head - Texas Monthly

This is a once in a lifetime role, admits Kelly Reilly about portraying the fierce Beth Dutton on Yellowstone, who may be the most talked-about fan-favorite character on all of TV this past season. For our recent webchat she adds, if someone had told me what a gift that this would end up being, just personally, creatively, professionally, Reilly says, its been one of those opportunities and I value it, I treasure it. Watch our exclusive video interview above.

Yellowstone is top-rated scripted show on TV, with the Paramount Network drama breaking records and shattering hearts last season. As the neo-Westerns superb fourth season basks in widespread praise, cast and crew are back in production for its highly anticipated fifth season, which will debut on November 13. The neo-Western was created by Oscar nominee Taylor Sheridan (Hell or High Water), about a powerful Montana ranching family under constant threat as the vast, gorgeously rendered Montana landscapes belie the harsh, violent world that the Duttons operate within. Oscar, Emmy and SAG Award winner Kevin Costner (Dances With Wolves, Hatfields & McCoys) stars as family patriarch John Dutton, with Reilly co-starring as the ruthless Beth alongside TV siblings LukeGrimes as favorite son KayceeandWes Bentley as black sheep Jamie, withCole Hauser portraying rancher Rip Wheeler, the Duttons honorary adopted son and Beths devoted lover.

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The epic sagas fourth season premiere was watched by a staggering 8.38 million live viewers, breaking ratings records as cables most watched episode of any series since 2018. Just like its viewership, the critical response to the show has also built steadily over the years, with its fourth season garnering an impressive86% fresh ratingat Rotten Tomatoes, claiming nominations so far this year from the producers guild, art directors guild, the Cinema Audio Society (where it won for sound mixing) and a SAG Award nomination forBest Drama Ensemble.

Beth Dutton is a 21st century Lady Macbeth, scorching the earth around her in pursuit of her intense, white-hot quest for vengeance over the catastrophic events of the Season 3 finale and her traumatic past. A formidable and ruthless power-player rarely showing vulnerability or weakness, its no wonder that in this day and age of political correctness, audiences love watching Beth cut everyone around her down to size with a terrifying glance or scathing insult, as she often has the last say, delivering the best one-liners on the show. When you start a project, you have no idea if its going to work. So, when we all signed on five years ago, I knew because of Taylor Sheridan and the writing that it was going to be dangerous and brilliant and beautiful, Reilly declares about her larger-than-life character. When I read episode one the pilot of the first season, I had never read a female character like her before, she says. Not a femme fatale, not a man-eater, not someone whos just a bitch, but these very conflicting layers of who this woman was, with deep-rooted trauma and pain underneath this fearless thunderstorm of a woman. I find her heart and her loyalty and her devotion to her father beautiful. I also find it incredibly sad; she moves me a lot. The way Taylor writes her, he clearly loves writing her and some of the things I get to do and say as Beth, you know theres only one way to do it, which is to fully commit.

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Matthew Valasik and Shannon Reid| The Fayetteville Observer

Former Wisconsin Proud Boy member saw bigotry and bullying

Daniel Berry joined the Wisconsin Proud Boys in search of camaraderie, but instead found racism, antisemitism and sadistic bullying.

Jasper Colt, USA TODAY

As the House Select Committee continues public hearings on the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection, far-right groups including theProud Boysand theOath Keepersare a prominent topic of discussion.

At the same time, both of those groupsleadersare facingcriminal chargesofseditious conspiracy. They are alleged to have worked together to oppose by force the authorityof the Government of the United States.

More: Jan. 6 committee says probe shows Trump led and directed effort to overturn 2020 election: hearing recap

Those charges can be difficult to prove in court. But regardless of the outcome of any prosecution that alleges these groups worked to overthrow the government,our researchhas shown that the more committed members of these and otherextreme right-wing groupsbelieve that the U.S. government, as currently constituted, is illegitimate and should be overthrown and replaced with one that is based on white supremacy.

Proud Boys have identified themselves as Western chauvinists who focus on opposing political correctness and white guilt. But these claims have generally been seen ascover for deeper racist and antisemitic sentiments. For some Proud Boys members, this group was a stepping stone to moreextreme groups, such as The Base.

More: Love heals. Hate kills. Where do you stand in this dark time of mass shootings?

Like anystreet gang, the Proud Boys as a national group is made up of semi-autonomous chapters of varying numbers and abilities. They are in different degrees of contact and coordination with other chapters. Its not clear the level of interest or capability that most members have in actually following through with overthrowing the government.

Oath Keepers is an anti-government group that calls itself a militia focused ondefending the Constitution and fighting tyranny. Former Oath Keepers spokesman Jason Van Tatenhove stated that the group is actually selling the revolution, meaning that the group is pushing conspiracy theories and propaganda to facilitate confrontations with federal law enforcement.

More: Prosecutors charge former Proud Boys leader, 4 others with seditious conspiracy in Jan. 6 attack

While members of theProud Boyshave concentrated their confrontations onanti-fascistsor other protesters, Oath Keepers have participated in several armed standoffs against the government.

In 2014, theOath Keepers joined an armed standoffbetween far-right patriot groups in Nevada on behalf ofCliven Bundy. In 2015, Oath Keepers showed up heavily armed in Ferguson, Missouri, during protests over the killing ofMichael Brown. And in 2016, Oath Keepers were present at the armed takeover of theMalheur National Wildlife Refugein Oregon.

Historically, prosecutions of seditious conspiracy charges succeeded againstmilitant IslamistorMarxist groups.

But prosecuting far-right groups has tended to be much more difficult. In 1988,Louis Beam, a figurehead in the white power movement, and 13 white supremacists from groups such as the Aryan Brotherhood and the Ku Klux Klan wereacquittedof conspiring to kill a federal judge and an FBI agent and plotting to overthrow the federal government to establish an all-white nation in the Pacific Northwest.

In 2012, charges of seditious conspiracy against members ofHutaree, a militant far-rightChristian nationalistgroup, weredismissedafter the judge concluded the government had not proved there was an actual conspiracy.

But it is clear from the charges stemming from the Jan. 6 insurrection involvinghundreds of alleged participants that police and prosecutors aretaking seriously the threat of violent actionbyProud Boys, Oath Keepers and other far-right groupsagainst individuals, organizations and local and national governments.

Shannon Reid, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at UNC Charlotte. Matthew Valasik, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at The University of Alabama.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.

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A prominent part of the Jan. 6 hearings, right-wing groups like Proud Boys seek to build a white nation - The Fayetteville Observer