Daily Archives: September 3, 2022

To Save the Deep Ocean, We Should Mine the Moon – Nautilus Magazine

Posted: September 3, 2022 at 4:51 pm

Its a Faustian bargain for the Anthropocene: The greatest source of rare-earth metals are to be found at the bottom of the seaand so are Earths most fragile ecosystems, an undisturbed and largely unexplored world of marvels.

The metals are required for the batteries that could power the clean energy revolution so desperately needed to avert the worst consequences of fossil fuel pollution-induced climate change, not to mention meet consumer demand for electronics. Yet mining them will have devastating consequences.

In an ideal world, mining would proceed slowly, with great caution, attentive to the creatures sacrificed for our appetites and to as-yet-unstudied consequences for Earths biogeochemical cycles. But the world is not ideal, and plans for deep-sea mining have proceeded at breakneck pace, with nearly 600,000 square miles of exploration permits granted by the International Seabed Authority and commercial mining expected to begin within the next several years.

We have a responsibility to life on the planet and to the diversity of the planet.

Humanitys demand for metalsand the profits that will accrue from mining themis on a collision course with deep-sea life. It appears that devastation is imminentunless, argues Lewis Pinault, we mine the moon instead. We have this gift of our geological twin, the moon, to provide us with mineral and energy wealth, says Pinault. The trick is figuring out how.

Trained as an MIT engineer and NASA geophysicist, with an international law degree to boot, Pinault is a partner at Airbus Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on planetary challenges. Though moon mining may seem impossibly difficult at first glance, Pinault sees it as an engineering challenge no more daunting than mining the ocean floor, and certainly far less destructive. Once weve done the hard work of knowing where to mine, he says, the next steps are solvable.

Nautilus talked to Pinault about his extraordinary vision.

In an op-ed published earlier this year you described the International Seabed Authority (ISA) as successful. Ive encountered many people who have a different opinion of the ISA. To them, its like a faulty brake on a runaway train.

The fact that it exists is, to me, kind of a success story in its own right. The Law of the Sea treaty that gave birth to the ISA has a very long and contentious history, and I love that it is what it is: a piece of commons law embodying the belief that there are areas of the planet beyond any notion of national boundary, a treaty created to protect shared and common resources that are both precious and subject to harm, a recognition that we need some way to figure out our relationship with them.

If we go back to President Johnsons administration, during the height of Great Society thinking, he was genuinely bothered by growing inequities in the world. He thought that the developing world needed a better deal out of capitalism, because the end game of capitalism didnt seem like it was going to be able to distribute any wealth to them.

With the discovery of abundant, widespread deep-sea manganese nodules 5,000 meters down, there was a sense of immense wealth that could be shared with everyone. And so a lot of the Law of the Sea development in the 1960s and into the 1970s was around a regime for profit-sharing from this kind of windfall. At its height, when the ISA was established, it was modeled on the oil and gas industrys licenses for explorationexcept the license fees would immediately start being distributed to different countries, and the profits would almost entirely be redistributed around the world. So the International Seabed Authority was constructed with generous and amazing intentions.

Much of the wealth distribution elements have been effectively torn out of it, but the United Nations and its authority is remarkably the go-to place for would-be explorers today. They still have the power to grant the licenses. They still have the power to do environmental impact studies and they are required to finance environmental researchers in those countries. Thats a pale trace of what the ISA was meant to bebut its still something that can be worked with.

Scientists and conservationists say that deep-sea mining needs to proceed slowly, with great caution, because we know so little about the ecosystems that would be impactedthat is, destroyedand how those changes would ripple out into Earths systems. Mining companies, along with their investors and the nations they partner with, want to go fast. And it seems like theyre winning.

The already-enormous demand for minerals will only grow; the ISA has granted exploration licenses to vast areas of the ocean floor, and companies are pushing to start commercial operations immediately. In fact The New York Times just published an investigation into how the ISA appears to have given unfairly preferential access to a company that intends to start industrial-scale seabed mining by 2024. What do you see happening in the next few years?

Its happening fast. There was supposed to have been a cycle of exploration licenses, which are paid for and generate monies that go into environmental impact studies, which are then actually professionally conducted and assessed by multidisciplinary teams and subject to public review. Its not supposed to be a path toward payment of corrupt dollars to a vulnerable nation-state saying, By the way, heres your money. And we trust you to fully use it on environmental impact assessmentbut with the substantial risk it more likely goes into somebodys pocket.

Theyre supposed to actually present the environmental study before the exploration license is turned into permission to harvest. So per the New York Times investigation, it seems something is broken, potentially tragically. Not just for the oceans, but because we may be missing an important analogue and opportunity to design a properly working system for mining the moon.

Even if the process is run properly, though, it just feels likebarring some unforeseen surge in concern for ecosystems that almost nobody will ever see, that were connected to through only by screens and consisting mostly of funny-looking invertebratesthat seabed mining is going to happen sooner or later.

And I say that as someone who loves funny-looking invertebrates, but people already accept the destruction every day of terrestrial ecosystems that are teeming with charismatic animals and more immediately connected to human well-being than the deep ocean seems to be.

Maybe this has the makings of an unlikely alliancealthough, at least in my head, not so unlikelybetween people who are ready to protect new species, unseen and uncatalogued and unknown, through the right application of precautionary principle, and people who like extractive industries. Its in the interest of people who like the idea of moon mininglike I do, mining in space that is ultimately to the benefit of Earth and its biosphereto put a hold on ocean mining. Because that will change the economics.

The moon is a particular puzzle because its fractal. You just get craters and more craters.

I think there is room for a movement, if you will, to say, Look, we have a responsibility to life on the planet and to the diversity of the planet. And we have this gift of our geological twin, the moon, to provide us with mineral and energy wealth. Its going to be hard, expensive work; you have to get there, you have to warm the lunar soil, you have to extract and beneficiate the minerals, you have to do a lot of remote or highly-automated operations. But the technology is heading in that direction.

Fast-advancing artificial intelligence and guidance systems give us confidence that a not-too-human-intensive mining operation can practically return lots of mineral materialand potentially an abundance of clean energyto Earth.

But if seabed mining is established on a meaningful scale in the near future, wouldnt that preclude the development of a more-expensive, more-technically-challenging moon mining industry?

I think there can still be a path forward. I would grab whatever seabed mining is happening as an opportunity for analysis. How well is it working? What are the difficulties? Where are you smelting? Where are you refining the minerals that you get? What does that cost? In projects I was involved in, in the 1980s, this actually stopped much of any idea of mining offshore Hawai`ian waters, because you had to put a smelter nearby and do the environmental impact study and no island in Hawai`i was ready to accept one.

I would say, Look, heres the data. You want to get this much cobalt. You want to get these rare earth metals. This is what it takes. This is what it costs. I would underscore the unaccounted-for impacts and say, Well, getting the same things from the moon is not 1,000 times more expensive. Its (say) 10 times. Then, to me, it becomes a debate.

How sustainable is seabed mining? Are you going to do this all over? If you start changing life patterns in ecosystems, those impacts are going to propagate in ways that we dont understand. So I think if were in the zone of it being 10 times more expensive to go to the moon, maybe we could leverage data about seabed mining.

Lets say the future rolls out like that. Seabed mining is too destructive, people want an alternative, and mining the moon is an alluring possibility. What are the challenges to making it a reality?

Ill start with the technical. To develop scalable mining on the moons surface, you want to start as close as possible to exactly the right place so that youre not mining someplace with poor concentrations of a particular mineral. This is the same thing we would do on Earth. We would do a mineral assay to estimate the potential quality and lifetime of a mine. But its not very practical to do what we would do here, which is to send field geologists and drilling equipment and drive around in well-instrumented trucks.

That means, to the extent possible, doing remote sensing, and by remote sensing I mean orbital data-gathering. But even in my own workI work with Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter images, from an onboard stereo camera thats been continually photographing the moon since 2009its hard to know what its looking at at any given time. There is no standard coordinate system. And the moon is a particular puzzle because its fractal. If you showed me a picture taken 50 meters from the surface and 5 meters from the surface and 5,000 meters from the surface, I would have trouble telling youunless I recognized a featurewhat is what. You just get craters and craters and more craters. Theres micrometeorite impacts that the human eye cant see, up to vast craters that we can see with our eyes from Earth. It all looks the same.

We have this gift of our geological twin, the moon, to provide us with mineral and energy wealth.

And we dont have a fleet of communication satellites orbiting the moon, much less GPS systems, so even if you have the data, you dont have a way to bring it to any other place. So firstly you need some kind of a reliable communications system. At Airbus Ventures weve invested in companies like ispace, which has won a contract with NASA to help deploy and run two communications satellites in conjunction with a lander on the moons far side.

Then we need a much more detailed mineral map of the moon. That might come through refinements of work that began 20 years ago, but that might be better achieved using quantum sensing. We invested in Q-CTRL in Australia partly because their quantum sensors are good for Earth, measuring ocean wave heights and movements and underground aquifer surfacesbut you can also use them to learn a lot about which minerals might be where, at high resolution. So orbiting quantum sensors is a great start, and then theres nothing like taking samples. The Chinese space program recently achieved just that, from a mineralogically promising high-latitude area on the lunar near side, the first such mission in nearly 50 years. They got a rover, disturbed the surface, dug a hole, then stuck it in a canister and blew it back to Earth and are analyzing it. Thats the kind of thing I expect we can be doing a lot more of, and with the right equipment, in situ.

Compare this with the oceans, where we have a pretty good idea of where the seabed minerals are, but the next stepthe extraction, the smelting, the processingis where it gets hard. What excites me about the moon is that once weve done the hard work of knowing where to mine, the next steps are more readily soluable. We have startup companies were looking at now that have designed mineral processing machines specifically for lunar environments.

We have also invested in other companies that produce solar panels so efficient and lightweight that blanketing part of the moons surface for solar energy collection begins to look practicable. We see other companies tackling autonomous production of solar panels directly from lunar materials. These panels are needed to supply energy and heat; even during lunar daytime, its very cold just under the moons surface, and you need heat for efficient extraction. And its then you can start using mining skills from Earth.

The next step is running the prototypes of these machines. Then we need to start thinking about how to return these minerals to Earth.

That was my next question.

Theres been a lot of thinking over the years about mass drivers, railguns, things that would fling loads from the moon to Earth or to Earth orbit. Already in our portfolio we have what we think is one great idea of using solar power to slowly spin up a launcher or a mass at the end of a tether. On Earth, this company, SpinLaunch, uses an artificial vacuum in a gigantic chamber to achieve the speeds they need to reach suborbital velocities. On the moon, theres no interfering atmosphere. The gravity is much lower and the vacuum is free. Its not hard to conceive of taking one of their designs and deploying it as a mass driver on the moon quite cheaply.

All these pieces, I think, can be put together and proven as a system to identify the right area for extraction; begin the extraction process; land the equipment that can do the purification; automate it to the extent possible; and to provide the power needed to start returning minerals to Earth. The timelines, compared to ocean mining, dont look that differentparticularly if the ISA has any teeth left to enforce its own environmental regimes.

As soon as we know where minerals on the moon are, I think we can proceed very quickly.

The environmental impacts of seabed mining do have to be assessed. Then they have to be digested and incorporated into any mining protocol. It should take time to do that properly. And I would like to think that the worlds citizens would want to weigh in on that process and think hard about whether this is something we really want to scale. In the meantime, as soon as we know where minerals on the moon are, I think we can proceed very quickly with the technological requirements to pull things into place. There may be other scientific, even profound benefits in processing lunar materialsas part of my own research I focus on whether dust-sized traces of other technological civilizations might be mixed in these very materials, and offer direct constraints on how uniquely precious our lives and futures may bebut perhaps we can pick up that topic in your newsletter.

You are passionate about the moral principle of sharing the wealth produced by ocean mining. One thing to come out of the New York Times investigation was a sense that people in countries partnering with mining companies would receive only the crumbs that fell from their leaders tables, so to speakand if youre a speculative fiction fan, then youre probably familiar with the trope of extraterrestrial mining magnates presiding over dystopian space colonies. How do you ensure that the profits of moon mining are actually shared?

This is worth a lot of attention and thought. There may be different and much more fair ownership systems, if ownership is the direction we want to go in. I believe that the International Seabed Authority, as it was originally conceived, was a great start. It embraced the idea that not everybody was an ocean state with the infrastructure to use its own offshore areas, much less exploit the high seas. Space is very similar. Not everyone has access. There is a rush to be a stakeholder.

I think we desperately need to look at the adoption of an International Space Authority. This means that you probably need a United Nations-affiliated source that is able to back such an authority with teeth and then staff it without so many avenues to corruption. And then they can open the gate to letting venture capitalists and corporations do what they dobut under a regime of enforcement and regulation that has guardrails in place so thatsocial justice is actually delivered alongside planet-saving benefits and any ethically enabling corporate gains.

And to me, that social justice is very much for the people alive today, and all the beings we share this planet with, but also for the possible trillions of people post-humanity and beings were responsible for in the future. That also raises questions about other life on this planet; were not in a position to ask, and theyre not in a position to answer, what kind of future they want. So I think what we probably need is an integrated approach of international, environmental, and living-being ethicists, together with people who work for a living on social justice and wealth distribution issues, and the companies and technologies and countries who have all their own self-interests. And if this is something that is forcing us to think hard about those kinds of issues, that can only be a good thing.

Lead image: Pavel Chagochkin / Shutterstock and Kstudija / Shutterstock

Posted on August 31, 2022

Brandon Keim (Twitter / Instagram) is a science and nature journalist. He is presently working on Meet the Neighbors, a book about what understanding animals as fellow persons means for human relations to wild animals and to nature.

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To Save the Deep Ocean, We Should Mine the Moon - Nautilus Magazine

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Someone Wonders What’s The Most Ridiculous Reason Your Child Had A Meltdown? And 50 Parents Give Hilarious Answers – Bored Panda

Posted: at 4:48 pm

Children, quite like Karens, are notorious meltdown makers. In what seems like a fraction of second, they go from little angels bringing joy into our miserable adult world to full-on tantrum machines powered by screaming and crying, rolling on the floor, and cursing like uncle Bob.

But parents werent born yesterday. They either have already found a reliable antidote to such meltdowns and proven way to take back control, or they manage to simply not care and save their nerves when it occurs.

So this thread from Ask Reddit has parents sharing the most ridiculous reasons their child had a meltdown, and trust us, it doesnt get any funnier than that. Turns out that virtually anything can be a trigger for a child's freakout, and it can just as well be cute and wholesome.

He saw that scene from Spongebob where Patrick was upset because he couldnt see his own forehead. My son saw it, realized he couldnt see his own forehead, then had a meltdown.

Hugh_manateerian Report

My daughter got mad because I cut her sandwich into triangles instead of rectangles. She threw it at the wall, pointed at Santa, and screamed, PUT ME ON THE NAUGHTY LIST!

jeff_the_nurse , Eaters Collective Report

Meltdowns are inseparable from having kids. Our little daredevils are notorious tantrum throwers, and its just a question of severity and frequency with which they occur. There are countless parenting methods created to take back control of a child in meltdown, and ways to make sure it doesnt happen.

Tantrums and meltdowns can be generated by a lot of different things: fear, frustration, anger, and sensory overload, to name a few. Moreover, a tantrum isnt a very clear way to communicate, but theyre very powerful in getting not just parents' but every onlookers attention.

A full on screaming temper tantrum because he didn't want to go to McDonald's with us. It was STUPID we're not going to STUPID MCDONALDS!!! Then as soon as we finished going through the drive thru, through tears he asked for his chicken nuggets and contentedly ate his happy meal soon after. Toddlers are weird man.

zerbey , Thabang Report

This article on the Childmind Institute argues that we should think of a tantrum as a reaction to a situation a child cant handle in a more grown-up way. By talking about how he feels, or making a case for what he wants, or just doing what hes been asked to do. Instead, he is overwhelmed by emotion.

If unleashing his feelings in a dramatic way crying, yelling, kicking the floor, punching the wall, or hitting a parent serves to get him what he wants (or out of whatever he was trying to avoid), its a behavior that he may come to rely on.

I've got two kids. While driving, a bird pooped on our car window on one side of the car. The kid farthest from that side of the car looked at it, and the other one started yelling "You can't look at the bird poop! It's on my side of the car so it's MY bird poop!" and then a big fight broke out.

supenguin Report

At about age 2, he was trying to get out of his bed, put his hand on the wall, then put his other hand over it, and tried to remove his first hand. The weight/push force of his second hand kept his first hand pinned to the wall. He started screaming in terror, pushing back with all his might... on top of his first hand. I had to grab his second hand, then yank his first hand free.

He was inconsolable for a while.

punkwalrus Report

It was my wife's time of the month, and I asked her if she needed any feminine products as I was leaving for the store. My 2 year old son then proceeded to throw himself on the floor demanding that he wanted 'feminine prodos' as well.

mr_patsy , Alexander Grey Report

Challenges like meltdowns are a quintessential part of being a parent. Many people know that and are still willing to make a sacrifice for the better good and having a fulfilling life with kids. Others, however, choose a very different path, which is staying childfree.

This is, of course, not to say that people choose not to have kids because its difficult raising them, rather they make a decision for a complex of reasons. They may range from rising living costs, rising housing prices, widespread concerns about social media and climate change, peoples own childhood experiences, and simply not wanting children.

I wouldn't buy him a combine harvester, an axe or a cow. All full sized real things. Not toys

floydie1962 Report

School was over. That was completely unacceptable. 4yo straight up starfishes himself on the path where the entire school had to step over/around him screaming about how he doesnt want to go home. It made me look like the best parent in the world.

Andiwowow , Ivan Aleksic Report

The spoon was the wrong color, then when I got the right one it was toxic since I was the one to grab it, so I put it back and then it was too far and they wanted me to get it for them, and after that they wanted the original one they threw on the floor. I picked it up and handed it to them but apparently it was toxic again so they threw it, climbed down the chair, picked it up, then went back to their yogurt and started to happily eat. Toddlers am I right?

You meant just today this morning right?

Cognizant_Psyche , Harry Grout Report

Despite the fact that the childfree lifestyle is gaining popularity every day, its still viewed with a huge stigma in our society. To find out what are the reasons for so many people condemning those who opt for life without kids, Bored Panda spoke with Dr. Audrey Tang, a chartered psychologist and author of multiple books, including "Be A Great Manager Now", "The Leader's Guide to Mindfulness," and "The Leader's Guide to Resilience. It turns out this has a lot to do with human nature and our tendency to be judgemental toward others.

When we live in a society with others (and this is evident in the animal kingdom), we tend to understand our place in the pack through acknowledging ourselves in comparison to others with the goal being access to resources, Tang argues.

Him: I don't want English peas for breakfast

Me: I'm not cooking English peas for breakfast

Him: *head buried in the couch SOBBING

Aggravating_Client36 Report

According to Tang, in humans, we are fighting less over a perceived scarcity of food and water, but (especially in the social media world) a need for acknowledgment and validation. Further to which, building self-esteem has focused on appreciating the self but often in comparison to others (e.g. I didnt win but at least I didnt come last).She explained that we are brought up judging others to know our position.

Moreover, Tang claims that in evolutionary terms, this is perhaps sensible. By making it clear there is someone else (a 'weaker prey' perhaps) to focus on, we can remain safe.

My nephew told me that 7/11 is called that because it's open seven hours a day, eleven days a week. I told him that there aren't 11 days in the week and he lost his little mind.

Don't correct a toddler if it doesn't matter in the long run.

Flaky_Tip Report

Oooo ooo oo. Not me, but my brother. Apparently, my mom found him (early 90s) sitting in the doorway between the house and the great outdoors crying hysterically because he wasn't sure if he wanted to stay in or go outside.

OakHallowedBThyAcorn Report

Tang told Bored Panda that it becomes all too easy to, rather than show acceptance of difference or even learn from that other person, try to negate that of the other it is the act of normative idealization. She continued explaining that normative idealization is when you think like what I do is normal, what you do is odd (it makes our own ego feel better); or to return to my first point of looking outwards - we might alternatively just be picking on others to avoid thinking about our own problems and something which makes them 'different' is an easy target and sometimes it means by bringing someone down (rather than working to raise ourselves up), we feel better about ourselves and dont need to admit we need to do something about our own insecurities.

Ohhh, man. Let's see...

*I microwaved her hot dog.

*I wouldn't give her a second olive

*I wouldn't let him jump on a trampoline in the rain

*She didn't want to be buckled into her carseat when I picked her up from daycare. She didn't want to get OUT of her carseat when we got home 2 blocks later. Then she was upset because all the candy was gone from her 6-month-old trick-or-treat bag.

*The sticker she peeled off my wife's orange apparently didn't meet expectations.

raistliniltsiar Report

Having said that, Tang claims that we have evolved since that point, although perhaps our brains haven't quite, and we need to teach it healthy behaviors.

Judging others in the context of who is living life best is not helpful, it is far more healthy to focus your energies on living your own best life, and if others are inspired, perhaps you can tell them how you did it and what your choices were... if they don't - you just do you." She added that in the words of Ru Paul - if they aren't paying your bills, you pay them no mind!

I flipped out because my mom used the Native American word for corn, mas, because she is Dutch and they call it that over there. I remember freaking the f**k out because I didnt want to eat poor baby mice. I ran upstairs in a blind panic.

For a few years afterwards Id sometimes grab handfuls of dried corn from the kitchen to save them and I made beds out of cotton balls for the individual pieces of corn lol.

DameDrunkenTheTall Report

Full on meltdown last week because I wouldnt let him take a nap with a bowl of chicken nuggets. Hes only two and I know shits about to get wilder than that.

Alternative_Plate398 Report

My daughter frequently asks me what a word means (irritated, archery, hilarious, etc), then when I tell her she screams NOOO THAT'S WRONG and cries. Every time. She thinks I'm an idiot I guess. Also, why the hell are you asking me if you THINK you know what it means already smh.

796807 Report

His pants were too gentle. His cookie was sleeping. He said good morning to the cat and the cat didnt say good morning back to him. The toilet was yelling at him. (He had flushed it). It was his birthday and he was excited to go see a Day Out With Thomas the Tank Engine and then we left the house to go see A Day Out With Thomas The Tank Engine.

TheYankunian Report

He didn't want long food. No food that was a long shape whatsoever. It was an interesting phase.

terminator_chic Report

Because she wanted to go to school, at 8 pm, at age 3, never having gone to a school ever.

ShabbyBash Report

Not a parent, but a daycare worker.

As soon as I saw this, my mind jumped to the moment I watched a two-year-old throw himself onto the ground, kicking and screaming, because I wouldn't let him stick peas up his nose.

CommonGrackle_ Report

Mine was heartbroken that his gingerbread man had broken after about 6 hours of playing with it.

He also had a meltdown because hes potty training and he had a poo in the toilet.

marshmallow-fluff- Report

I cut her waffle into squares instead of rectangles. RIP my Saturday morning.

TonyTheLieger Report

Ok I'm not a parent but I was looking after my baby cousin and we were sat on the sofa watching a movie and he cried because he couldn't hug the cat on the screen

Separate-Ant-9646 Report

Foreword I take these very seriously and we're working to help her even if the content makes me giggle afterwards.

Not a meltdown per se but some of the things my daughter screams when she has night terrors are less than terrifying.

"NononoNO DONT EAT MY CAAAAAKE"

"THEY CANT DO THAT THE FEATHERS ARE ON THE WRONG STATUE"

"I can't do this I can't I can't I can't I can't put on shoes I'm wearing sandals""

Threndsa Report

I remember once my little brother was super mad he wasn't given two of some kind of treat. So my mom took it from him, broke it in half, and gave him the two pieces. Just like that he was happy

TehAsianator Report

My wife brought home pizza for dinner. It had sausage and pepperoni, my sons favorite. He freaked out and refused to eat it because the sausage was crumbled instead of in little balls

professor_dog , The Nix Company Report

Going through a drive through we asked my daughter if she wanted a breakfast sandwich. When we ordered a bacon egg and cheese biscuit she had a melt down for 30 minutes insisting she wanted a sandwich and not a biscuit.

SEPTSLord , Jeremy Bishop Report

When I was little, about four years old, I was very upset that my mom was pregnant with my little brother. So much so, that at one night as she tucked me in, I looked her dead in the eyes and said "I'll miss you so much when the new baby gets here and I have to run away." I then proceeded to have a hysterical meltdown. This was a few days after I had to be picked up from my grandparents' house one night because they had a kid's stool with the Three Bears on it and it made me bawl because that wouldn't be like my family any more.

Almost twenty years later, my brother and I have a good relationship, but it definitely took some convincing to get there.

HatchedAttic21 Report

I was drinking some tea and he was upset when he found out I did that without him choosing a type of tea for me. He doesn't even drink tea. He cried and insisted I make a new pot of tea with the tea of his choice.

gorogy Report

She couldnt see the moon (new moon. It happens). Insisted it went to New York city and sobbed.

Missprisskm Report

One day my son got extremely upset because his French fry was too long, so I broke it in half. The French fry was then, too short. Absolute meltdown.

elmsa517 Report

My god daughter cried on a trip to the aquarium as there were no "fishies" in the car park. At the end of the day when she was ready to leave she said, in a matter of fact way, that she hated fishies. Can't please them.

Schofief Report

My son at the time was mainlining string cheese in hopes of not turning him into string cheese he was cut off for like a day. So picked him up from daycare walk into the house not a single word said he went running through the house and dropped down crying his head off. I asked whats wrong he said I want cheese! I told him no, you can have anything other than cheese. Well I thought he was in a full on meltdown, I was wrong, he ran across the house dropped like he was shot complete and utter meltdown, I decided this is so ridiculous, I better film this so I started recording. He looked up to see if it was working, I was stone faced, back to meltdown. Then I asked whats wrong? He promptly stood up not a single tear falling and questioningly said cheese?

It became a thing when someone is losing their s**t, to ask cheese?

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Someone Wonders What's The Most Ridiculous Reason Your Child Had A Meltdown? And 50 Parents Give Hilarious Answers - Bored Panda

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Cruise Lines That Don’t Require a COVID-19 Vaccination – Cruise Fever

Posted: at 4:47 pm

Cruise lines have begun to get rid of their COVID-19 vaccine requirement that they have mandated over the past 15 months since cruises have restarted.

MSC Cruises As of September 1, 2022, MSC Cruises no longer requires U.S. citizens to be vaccinated. MSC currently offers cruises to the Caribbean and Bahamas from Florida. View Best Prices on MSC

Norwegian Cruise Line Norwegian Cruise Line was the first major cruise line to announce the elimination of a COVID-19 vaccine requirement. This new policy goes into effect today, September 3, 2022. View Best Prices on NCL

Royal Caribbean Starting on September 5, 2022, guests who are not vaccinated will be able to sail on Royal Caribbean cruise ships, the worlds largest cruise line. View Best Prices on Royal Caribbean

Buh bye, buffets? Heres what its like to cruise now – The Boston Globe

Posted: at 4:47 pm

Cabin fever

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Ready to party on the Promenade Deck like its 2019? Heres the latest testing news:

When the CDC ended its COVID-19 cruise ship program in July, many cruise lines changed their health and safety protocols. Major companies like Royal Caribbean Group and Norwegian Cruise Line (who own several brands) rolled back their COVID-19 rules and removed testing requirements for vaccinated passengers on some voyages. Tests are still required in certain cases, though, depending on the policies of the ports to be visited. (The United States no longer requires a negative COVID test before reentering the country.)

On Oceania Cruises, the line we were sailing, vaccinated travelers 12 and older do not need to test to embark. Unvaccinated travelers, however, must present a negative, medically administered COVID-19 test that is not more than 72 hours old at the time of boarding.

We were sailing aboard Oceanias Marina, traveling from Trieste, Italy, to Rome. Our ports of call would include Split and Dubrovnik, Croatia, along with Kotor, Montenegro, Corfu, Greece, Messina (Sicily), and Sorrento/Capri, Italy. A new port every day, yay! We get excited about waking up someplace new and heading out to explore. This cruise line is known for that type of itinerary (many ports, few sea days) and its culinary program. Plus, Oceania was recently named one of Travel+ Leisures top cruise lines, praising the UK-trained master butlers. (Not all categories of cabins have butler service.)

So far, so good. But we soon discovered that our Venetian Vignettes-themed cruise wasnt actually boarding in Venice, or even stopping by for a quick Ciao! Cruise ships this size are no longer calling at the port, so our ship would sail from Trieste instead. No Piazza San Marco! No Palazzo Ducale! Bummer.

We arrived a day early for our cruise, a recommended strategy these days when flight delays and cancellations are common. Even though we were haggard from our red-eye flight, we managed to drag ourselves around Trieste and get acquainted. It turned out to be one of our favorite ports. Set on the cuff of Italys boot to the northeast, Trieste is situated between Slovenia and the Adriatic Sea. Once a Habsburg city under the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the city has an intriguing history and has been officially part of Italy only since 1954. Some Triestines are pushing for independence. The Piazza Unit dItalia was a perfect place to people-watch amid splendid neoclassical buildings, and we found a good spot for dinner near Triestes Instagram-worthy Canal Grande.

The following day, we walked over to our ship at the assigned time. Boarding typically a crowd-fest is now staggered, so there were no long lines. We showed our vaccination certificates (boosters arent currently required, but are strongly recommended since many ports require them). The ships crew is fully vaccinated, which is commonplace these days. Our bags were quickly whisked to our rooms, so we freshened up and, in true cruise mode, made a beeline for the food.

Who was that masked man?

Wed forgotten the true bounty of a cruise ship buffet: so many stations laden with tasty-looking edibles! On Oceania ships, all provisions are fresh, and everything is made from scratch. But there was no helping yourself to a taste of this or a bite of that, DIY-style; servers are lined up behind the buffet stations to handle the task. Its probably good, hygienically speaking, that there arent 400 different paws handling the calamari tongs, but this hybrid buffet takes getting used to. (Some cruise lines are returning to self-service buffets, Gray Faust said, so your experience may be different than ours.)

During those (rare) moments when we werent eating or drinking, our masks were on. Annoying, yes, but everyone seemed to be onboard (pun intended) with the concept. Some ports, like Italy, require masking for guests traveling there; for other destinations, masking is recommended but not required. Oceania recommends guests travel with several medical-grade masks, a.k.a. FFP2 masks, or KN-95 masks.

The muster drill, when passengers and crew gather for a safety briefing, has gone virtual. As mentioned, the ship can accommodate 1,238 passengers, but Oceania reduced capacity this summer and fall to give passengers more space. That meant no waiting in lines, plenty of pool chairs, and lots of staff attention (two crew members for every three guests, they say). For those who enjoy boisterous holiday-making in crowded clubs, this wasnt that. But every night there was a musical show, or a comedian, a hip magician (not an oxymoron, apparently), and, one night, a show featuring the comedian and the magician. For those still uneasy about hanging with others, Oceania offers 24-hour in-room dining. (We never had the Souffle of the Day but its available.) Theres also a new private dining experience, Prive, where guests can choose among dishes offered at Marinas specialty restaurants, along with a special degustation menu and a wine pairing menu.

Our favorite of the ships specialty restaurants was Toscana, where our low-carb resolutions disappeared as quickly as the fresh bucatini. Every bit of pasta and every smear of sauce was delicious. Oceania does its provisioning locally, and the supply chain was happily intact here.

The best meal we ate was probably the one we made ourselves at the Culinary Center, with a small group of committed (and spaced-apart) foodies. OK, granted, the recipes were created by acclaimed French chef Jacques Ppin, the cruise lines executive culinary director, so we could hardly go wrong. Our Steak Diane was fabulous, our pot d crme sublime. We even got to toss salad with our hands. Chef Jacques wasnt there to correct our mistakes; our instructor was Chef Leah Caplan, an early leader in the slow food movement and fun fact the culinary mastermind behind DiGiorno Pizza. She was so good, we booked a second event with her, a shopping and cooking excursion.

Yep, we did a lot of eating, but it was balanced with sightseeing: strolling museums and ancient walled cities in Croatia, crater-hopping Sicilys Mount Etna, and breezing up (and down) a famous chairlift in Capri, channeling Jackie O in white jeans (accessorized with masks instead of silk scarves, sigh). Since most of our excursions took place outdoors, we doffed the face coverings frequently, though. We brought our vaccination cards with us (along with our cruise cards) in case anyone asked to look at them. Nobody did. At the end of the day, we were greeted by our butler, Himanshu Dwivedi, who seemed delighted to see us each day and delivered tasty nibbles that we devoured (pre-gaming, but with food) before dinner.

Dressing up for dinner and a show is so festive! Exploring unfamiliar ports? As wonderful as ever. Who cares if we had to wear masks on the buses when we were discovering cool towns like Split and Dubrovnik? So, yes, its a different thing to cruise right now. And even that may change, as COVIDs never-ending variants come and go and ports refine or change their protocols. But the good parts of cruising happily remain.

For information: http://www.oceaniacruises.com. Oceanias six ships carry from 684 to 1,238 passengers. Prices begin at $1,599 per guest for a similar seven-day cruise to Italy and Greece aboard Marina in 2023. A new ship, the 1,200-passenger Vista, will set sail beginning next April.

Diane Bair and Pamela Wright can be reached at bairwright@gmail.com

Buh bye, buffets? Heres what its like to cruise now - The Boston Globe

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VATICAN – Seminar of formation for 80 new Bishops of the territories of first evangelization – Agenzia Fides

Posted: at 4:47 pm

Vatican City (Agenzia Fides) - A total of 80 bishops recently appointed in areas of Africa, Asia, America and Oceania that come under the first department of the Dicastery of Missions will take part in the study seminar that the Dicastery of Evangelization is organizing for them. The seminar will open on Monday, September 5th, at the Pontifical College of St. Paul the Apostle, with a Mass presided over by Cardinal Luis Antonio G. Tagle, and on Saturday, September 17th, with a Mass in St. Peter's Basilica and an audience with Pope Francis. The custom of seminaries, established in 1994, aims to offer all bishops who have recently been appointed to govern the parishes of the mission areas, at the beginning of their mandate, a period of reflection, of deepening their knowledge of life and the episcopal ministry, of dialogue and prayer. The speakers are leading personalities from the church world. The program includes three lectures a day, followed by discussions and group work. The day begins with a joint service and the prayer of Lauds and ends with the prayer of Vespers.During the seminar, the participants deal with eight basic topics, each of which is deepened in various lectures. The first theme is "The relationship between the diocesan Bishop and the Dicastery for Evangelization". The two days of study will open with the lectures of Archbishops Protase Rugambwa ("The Service of the Dicastery to the New Particular Churches") and Giampietro Dal Toso ("The Pontifical Mission Societies: Structures, Competences and Activities").The second theme, "The Roman Curia", will be presented on Wednesday September 7thby Msgr. Marco Mellino, who will speak on reform of the Roman Curia, and Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher on the Holy See and relations with States , with references to relations with local governments.Two study days on September 8th and 9th will be dedicated to evangelization and will deal with the proclamation of the faith, the use of the media, ecumenical and interreligious dialogue, educational institutions, the ministry of charity and the college of bishops. Among others, Msgr. Rino Fisichella, Msgr. Angelo Vincenzo Zani as well as Cardinal Luis Francisco Ladaria Ferrer will give lectures.The theme of the Liturgy (Il munus sanctificandi del Vescovo) will be expounded by Card. Arthur Roche on September 10th, while on Sunday September 11th at Castel Gandolfo the bishops will experience a day of spiritual retreat preached by Card. Raniero Cantalamessa.Several reports will deal with the theme of the Clergy, on 12 and 13, with contributions from Card. Lazzaro You Heung-Sik, Bishop Vincenzo Viva, Bishop Charles Jude Scicluna, Father Armando Nugnes and Father Hans Zollner.Bishop Giuseppe Sciacca and Bishop Juan Ignacio Arrieta will address the theme of diocesan structures on September 14th. The last two themes of the Seminar, Consecrated Life and the Laity, will be presented on September 15 and 16 by Msgr. Jos Rodriguez Carballo and Sister Genowefa Kudlik, Cardinal Kevin Joseph Farrell, Mrs. Linda Ghisoni and Mrs. Gabriella Gambino. Card. Richard Kuuia Baawobr, Bishop of Wa. (SL) (Agenzia Fides, 2/9/2022)

VATICAN - Seminar of formation for 80 new Bishops of the territories of first evangelization - Agenzia Fides

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Faucis Red Guards: The Mass Censoring of Social Media – Brownstone Institute

Posted: at 4:45 pm

One aspect of dictatorships that citizens of democratic nations often find puzzling is how the population can be convinced to support such dystopian policies. How do they get people to run those concentration camps? How do they find people to take food from starving villagers? How can they get so many people to support policies that, to any outsider, are so needlessly destructive, cruel, and dumb?

The answer lies in forced preference falsification. When those who speak up in principled opposition to a dictators policies are punished and forced into silence, those with similar opinions are forced into silence as well, or even forced to pretend they support policies in which they do not actually believe. Emboldened by this facade of unanimity, supporters of the regimes policies, or even those who did not previously have strong opinions, become convinced that the regimes policies are just and goodregardless of what those policies actually areand that those critical of them are even more deserving of punishment.

One of historys great masters of forced preference falsification was Chairman Mao Zedong. As Lszl Ladnyrecalled, Maos decades-long campaign to remold the people of China in his own image began as soon as he took power after the Chinese Civil War.

By the fall of 1951, 80 percent of all Chinese had had to take part in mass accusation meetings, or to watch organized lynchings and public executions.These grim liturgies followed set patterns that once more were reminiscent of gangland practices:during these proceedings, rhetorical questions were addressed to the crowd, which, in turn, had to roar its approval in unisonthe purpose of the exercise being to ensure collective participation in the murder of innocent victims; the latter were selected not on the basis of what they had done, but of who they were, or sometimes for no better reason than the need to meet the quota of capital executions which had been arbitrarily set beforehand by the Party authorities. From that time on, every two or three years, a new campaign would be launched, with its usual accompaniment of mass accusations, struggle meetings, self-accusations, and public executionsRemolding the minds, brainwashing as it is usually called, is a chief instrument of Chinese communism, and the technique goes as far back as the early consolidation of Maos rule in Yanan.

This decades-long campaign of forced preference falsification reached its apex during the Cultural Revolution, in which Mao deputized radical youths across China, called Red Guards, to purge all vestiges of capitalism and traditional society and impose Mao Zedong Thought as Chinas dominant ideology. Red Guards attacked anyone they perceived as Maos enemies, burned books, persecuted intellectuals, and engaged in the systematic destruction of their countrys own history, demolishing Chinas relics en masse.

Through this method of forced preference falsification, any mass of people can be made to support virtually any policy, no matter how destructive or inimical to the interests of the people. Avoiding this spiral of preference falsification is therefore why freedom of speech is such a central tenet of the Enlightenment, and why it is given such primacy in the First Amendment of the US Constitution. No regime in American history has ever previously had the power to force preference falsification by systematically and clandestinely silencing those critical of its policies.

Until now. As it turns out, anastonishingnewreleaseofdiscoverydocuments inMissouri v. Bidenin which NCLA Legal is representing plaintiffs including Jay Bhattacharya, Martin Kulldorff, and Aaron Kheriaty against the Biden administration for violations of free speech during Covidreveal a vast federal censorship army, with more than 50 federal officials across at least 11 federal agencies having secretly coordinated with social media companies to censor private speech.

Secretary Mayorkas of DHS commented that the federal Governments efforts to police private speech on social media are occurring across the federal enterprise. It turns out that this statement is true, on a scale beyond what Plaintiffs could ever have anticipated.The limited discovery produced so far provides a tantalizing snapshot into a massive, sprawling federal Censorship Enterprise, which includes dozens of federal officials across at least eleven federal agencies and components identified so far, who communicate with social-media platforms about misinformation, disinformation, and the suppression of private speech on social mediaall with the intent and effect of pressuring social-media platforms to censor and suppress private speech that federal officials disfavor.

The scale of this federal censorship enterprise appears to be far beyond what anyone imagined, involving even senior White House officials. The government is protecting Anthony Fauci and other high level officials by refusing to reveal documents related to their involvement.

The discovery provided so far demonstrates that this Censorship Enterprise is extremely broad, includingofficials in the White House, HHS, DHS, CISA, the CDC, NIAID, and the Office of the Surgeon General; and evidently other agencies as well, such as the Census Bureau, the FDA, the FBI, the State Department, the Treasury Department, and the US Election Assistance Commission.And it rises to the highest levels of the US Government, including numerous White House officials In their initial response to interrogatories, Defendants initially identifiedforty-fivefederal officials at DHS, CISA, the CDC, NIAID, and the Office of the Surgeon General (all within only two federal agencies, DHS and HHS), who communicate with social-media platforms about misinformation and censorship.

Federal officials are coordinating to censor private speech across all major social media platforms.

The third-party social-media platforms, moreover, have revealed that more federal agencies are involved.Meta, for example, has disclosed that at least 32 federal officialsincluding senior officials at the FDA, the US Election Assistance Commission, and the White Househave communicated with Meta about content moderation on its platforms, many of whom were not disclosed in response to Plaintiffs interrogatories to Defendants.YouTube disclosed eleven federal officialsengaged in such communications, including officials at the Census Bureau and the White House, many of whom were also not disclosed by Defendants.Twitter disclosed nine federal officials,including senior officials at the State Department who were not previously disclosed by Defendants.

Federal officials are granted privileged status by social media companies for the purpose of censoring speech on their platforms, and officials hold weekly meetings on what to censor.

These federal bureaucrats are deeply embedded in a joint enterprise with social-media companies to procure the censorship of social-media speech.Officials at HHS routinely flag content for censorship, for example, by organizing weekly Be On The Lookout meetings to flag disfavored content, sending lengthy lists of examples of disfavored posts to be censored,serving as privileged fact checkers whom social-media platforms consult about censoring private speech, and receiving detailed reports from social-media companies about so-called misinformation and disinformation activities online, among others.

Social media companies have even set up secret, privileged channels to give federal officials expedited means to censor content on their platforms.

For example,Facebook trained CDC and Census Bureau officials on how to use a Facebook misinfo reporting channel. Twitter offered federal officials a privileged channel for flagging misinformation through a Partner Support Portal.YouTube has disclosed that it granted trusted flagger status to Census Bureau officials,which allows privileged and expedited consideration of their claims that content should be censored.

Many suspected that some coordination between social media companies and the federal government was occurring, but the breadth, depth, and coordination of this apparatus is far beyond what virtually anyone imagined. And the scale of this censorship apparatus raises troubling questions.

How could so many federal officials be convinced to engage in the clandestine censorship of opposition to tin-pot public health policies fromChinawhich havekilledtens of thousands of young Americans andlets be honestwere never really that popular to begin with? The answer, I believe, is that high-level White House officials such as Anthony Fauci must have been simultaneously threatening social media companies if they did not comply with federal censorship demands, while also threatening entire federal bureaucracies if they did not toe the Party line.

By simultaneously threatening both the federal bureaucracy and social media companies, a handful of high-level officials could effectively transform the federal government into a sprawling censorship army reminiscent of Maos Red Guards, silencing any opposition to tin-pot public health policies with increasing detachment and certitude as this systematic silencing falsely convinced them that the regimes policies were just and good. A few of these federal employees must have eventually let slip to the Republicans that this jawboning was taking place, which appears to have been how this suit began.

In plaintiff Aaron Kheriatyswords:

Hyperbole and exaggeration have been common features on both sides of covid policy disputes. But I can say with all soberness and circumspection (and you, kind readers, will correct me if I am wrong here):this evidence suggests we are uncovering the most serious, coordinated, and large-scale violation of First Amendment free speech rights by the federal governments executive branch in US history.

Republished from the authors Substack

Michael P Senger is an attorney and author of Snake Oil: How Xi Jinping Shut Down the World. He has been researching the influence of the Chinese Communist Party on the worlds response to COVID-19 since March 2020 and previously authored Chinas Global Lockdown Propaganda Campaign and The Masked Ball of Cowardice in Tablet Magazine. You can follow his work on Substack

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Dip Salvador says, "Censorship Blocks Creative Output" – The Hype Magazine

Posted: at 4:45 pm

Features

Published on September 2nd, 2022 | by Paul Hernandez

While some countries offer legal protection against censorship, others do not. Even the nations that do afford these freedoms can require a fight to exercise them. Dip Salvador has a strong message for those who wish to block any creativity in music: it is futile to put limitations on art and creative expression.

This goes beyond a cultural plea as it can move into the field of being illegal. After all, artists and musicians have been jailed in numerous parts of the world for speaking their minds. Whether the censor boards feel the work is obscene or threatens civil unrest, Dip Salvador believes it is not about suppressing music; they are censoring human emotions.

Music is the ultimate vehicle for sharing creative expression; thus, it is deeply personal. Whether or not people seek to censor some music can be based solely on opinion and perception, which, as we all know, can vary tremendously. While some lyrics are straightforward and can raise even the most jaded eyebrows, others can be grossly misinterpreted.

Dip Salvador feels that no matter how direct or suggestive music is, it should be censored after interpreting numerous angles. The same goes for any type of art, for that matter.

But, as he says, if you dont like it, you dont have to look or listen, but do not impose your disapproval on others. So saying this to civilians is one thing, but swaying censor boards is another. His explanation is simple, Im not going to alter my work due to draconian laws.

The repression of speech and creativity is akin to blocking a part of our existence. It is a tactic to control and silence a population, not just a portion of that population. Dip Salvador advocates for letting creative expression flow freely and fearlessly.

Spotifyhttps://open.spotify.com/artist/6PN1qeD3PiiYj6QIDMqfUz

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100 Years Ago: How Hollywoods Early Self-Censorship Battles Shaped the MPA – Hollywood Reporter

Posted: at 4:45 pm

Long before Netflixs Blonde landed a controversial NC-17 rating, the Motion Picture Association gave films like Baby Doll (1956) and Whos Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966) adults only designations as a way to placate concerned parents and reformers.

Now, when news surfaces of Hollywood allegedly kowtowing to everything from domestic social crusaders to foreign governments, debate lights up headlines and social media conversations. But, historically speaking, industry moguls have most often erred on the side of not ruffling feathers, home or abroad, in order to court consumers as evidenced in the birth of the MPA 100 years ago.

The lobbying group, which is marking its centennial in 2022, was born as the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors Association in 1922. MPPDA counsel C.C. Pettijohn once told a 1929 Public Relations Conference that the film industry was first understood as a three-legged stool that included production, distribution, and exhibition. Pettijohn argued that the MPPDA allowed the public to work as the fourth leg that could make or break the industry.

One moment that led to its creation: When Americas Sweetheart Mary Pickford obtained a divorce from her husband, Owen Moore, in 1920 it rankled millions of Catholic fans sold on her wholesome image. When the gossip rags let loose about her man waiting in the wings, swashbuckling screen star Douglas Fairbanks, moral crusaders found new firepower to question the living standards in Hollywood. Things got worse when Pickford was accused of breaking up Fairbankss marriage. While Pickford and Fairbanks still managed to become Americas Royal Couple, the precedent for questioning Hollywoods morals was set.

Hollywood had another battle with social reformers in the wake of silent comedian Fatty Arbuckles scandalous San Francisco soiree that allegedly resulted in the death of actress Virginia Rappe. As trials commenced, discussions of censorship began to swirl, something the industry was staunchly against. Censorship is as rotten as human slavery and it has less friends, opined Moving Picture World editor-in-chief Arthur James in October 1921.

Hollywoods response was to self-regulate by creating the MPPDA in 1922. Pressures from social reformers led the industry to hire Will Hays, President Hardings Postmaster General, to come to the industry in hopes of winning the confidence of an increasingly weary public. Lewis Selznick referred to these turbulent times as an era of scandal. Selznick cited the new baseball commissioner as offering a template for Hollywood to maintain audience confidence. In his memoir, Hays wrote that while I am not a reformer, I hope that I have always been public-spirited. Hays offered a bridge between Hollywood and the public. Opposed to outright censorship, Hays opted for a democratic process, because self-regulation educates and strengthens those who practice it.

Hays accepted the industrys offer on January 14, 1922. When Hays took office, Arbuckles second trial was just about to begin. The nation was following the story closely, and while the comedian would eventually be acquitted (complete with an apology from the jury), Hays banned Arbuckle from the industry. The move showed industry skeptics that Hays was serious about keeping the industry clean. Adolph Zukor, head of Famous Players-Lasky (soon to be Paramount), shelved Arbuckles future projects and took a $500,000 loss. The industry distanced itself from problematic publicity, just as they have many times over the last century.

By the end of the 1922, Hays offered Arbuckle a comeback tour. It was too late. The court of public opinion had settled its case. Theater owners were worried that the one-eighty on Arbuckle would lose any public trust gained since Hayss appointment. The Motion Picture Theater Owners of America issued a statement, arguing that no act of any official can make up the public mind on this matter.

Hays offered a thirteen-point agreement that included eliminating from films overt sexuality, prostitution, cavalier depiction of vice, passionate love scenes, any ridicule of government or religion, and any salacious advertising. But the 1920s provided no shortage of scandalous material for Hays to moderate. Wallace Reids newsworthy drug addiction became a difficult, but manageable, public relations story. However, when stars like Rudolph Valentino, Gloria Swanson, and Clara Bow put their sexuality on screen in front of patrons the world over, it would erupt another series of social outcries. Others decried the Hollywood arrival of Elinor Glyn, author of the so-called sex novel Three Weeks (1907) and future inventor of Clara Bows It (1927).

For some U.S. consumers, movies had become nothing more than a Babylonian product. By the end of the decade, it was clear that moviemakers were not adhering to any self-censorship. An emphasized list of donts and be carefuls was added in 1927. Even publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst was lobbying for film censorship. A formal Production Code was added in 1930. Three general principals were emphasized: Movies should be regarded as entertainment, are important as an art form, and have moral obligations.

However, none of these added provisions along with the lengthy corresponding rulebook were followed any better than Hayss original thirteen points. The years 1930-1934 are lauded by fans as the last Pre-Code years when filmmakers had a heyday with stories that violated every facet of the Production Code. So-called fallen woman films (The Divorcee), gangster pictures (Scarface), sex-filled musicals (Gold Diggers of 1933), sex comedies (She Done Him Wrong), Depression pictures (Wild Boys for the Road) and everything in between ruled the day.

During the Pre-Code years, new forces arose to push back on Hollywoods free-for-all approach to lascivious content. The Payne Fund Studies began to (unsuccessfully) link the rise of juvenile delinquency with Hollywood movies. Each study was published while a summarizing and propagandizing volume was published as Henry James Formans Our Movie-Made Children (1933). Formans book became a best-seller, alerting studio moguls that the public was on the verge of being lost again. The Great Depression was hitting the studios. Even those that were in better shape at the end of the 1920s were feeling the effects by the Depressions nadir in 1933. Nobody in Hollywood was in a place to risk ticket sales.

At the same time, the Catholic Legion of Decency was up in arms over the dangers of films and even had a Legion Pledge that congregations spouted from the pews. I make this protest in a spirit of self-respect, concluded the pledge, and with the conviction that the American public does not demand filthy pictures, but clean entertainment. The social and political winds were blowing hard against the movie industry. It was time again to make a big move, as the previous decade had not offered a consistent response to social reformers.

The answer to the public concern was Joseph Breen, an Irish Catholic who worked as a journalist before landing jobs at the US Foreign Service and the 28th International Eucharistic Congress. It was at the Eucharistic Congress in Chicago during summer of 1926 that showcased the power of the Catholic Church in the United States. Catholics moved from the margins to the mainstream, and by 1933 were a sizable social and political force. The Legion of Decency also kept its own ratings system, never afraid to condemn a film it felt out of line with its own standards. This was the crowd Hollywood needed to appease.

Hays hired Breen to be the Codes enforcer, a role in which he served from 1934 until 1954 (which a brief stint running RKO in 1941). Less of a gentlemans agreement and more a process of arduous negotiation, the Production Code impacted film content and satisfied many anti-Hollywood activists for nearly two decades. Movies would now have to adhere to the industry standards, as no film would be released without a Production Code Administration seal.

By the end of 1934, newspapers around the country celebrated Hollywoods new direction. The Motion Picture Herald printed praise from the press who reflect audience appreciation of higher-class product, showing that the new strictures resulted in increased audience attendance.

The first years of the Motion Picture Association (as the MPPDA) set the standard for industry responses to contemporary mores. Hiring a political insider was the move in 1922, and by the early 1930s the industry needed to respond to growing church boycotts. Breen allowed the industry to create a product that met churchmen half-way. The social and political winds driven by the public, that global fourth stool-leg highlighted by Will Hays, will always be a major focus of Hollywoods operation.

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100 Years Ago: How Hollywoods Early Self-Censorship Battles Shaped the MPA - Hollywood Reporter

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Will Ethereum 2.0 be vulnerable to censorship? Industry professional explains – Cointelegraph

Posted: at 4:45 pm

The Ethereum network will be able to withstand censorship risks both in the short and long term, according to Ethereum community member and investor Ryan Berckmans.

The ban of Ethereum-based privacy tool Tornado Cash by U.S. authorities earlier this month left many wondering whether Ethereum transactions could be also at risk of censorship, especially after Ethereums imminent transition to a proof-of-stake system.

A widespread concern is that entities controlling a large chunk of staked Ether (ETH), such as Coinbase or Kraken, would start censoring transactions to comply with U.S. sanctions. That is an unlikely scenario, according to Berckmans, who sees the high centralization of staked ETH as a temporary issue.

With time, the costs of entry to the staking business will drop due to the maturity of open-source tools and industry expertise as well as the generally reduced risk profile, said Berckmans. That will allow more and more players to enter the staking business, thus reducing the dominance of large staking pools.

The idea that these will be able to somehow sustainably censor user transactions or affect the fork choice in Ethereum, its just not a credible idea, Berckmans pointed out.

Moreover, according to Berckmans, the Tornado Cash ban in the United States was a policy mistake that is unlikely to result in more government sanctions. He said that U.S. policymakers are likely to acknowledge the mistake and take a more favorable approach to Ethereum, which is inherently aligned with Americas interests.

Ethereum is about permissionless innovation, free enterprise, property rights, globalization, Berckmans explained.

Check out the full interview on our YouTube channel, and dont forget to subscribe!

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Will Ethereum 2.0 be vulnerable to censorship? Industry professional explains - Cointelegraph

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Chinas censorship reaches far beyond its own borders – The Guardian

Posted: at 4:45 pm

I read with interest your editorial (The Guardian view on Chinas censors: the sense of an (acceptable) ending, 24 August). In 2016, I was about to publish a book on pop art, which had a short section on artists responding to political and social turmoil in the 1960s, and which included an illustration of Jim Dines Drag Johnson and Mao (1967). The etching depicts Mao Zedong of the Peoples Republic of China and the US president Lyndon B Johnson, who sent troops to counter Chinese communist support in the Vietnam war.

Dines coloured etching applies cosmetic touches to the lips, cheeks and eyelids of these two supposed (and opposed) freedom fighters (and a black heart painted on the chin of Mao), essentially to caricature political propaganda and masculine conviction. The capitalist and communist leaders appear as drag actors whose posturing affects a global audience. The printers of my book a Chinese company forced the London publisher to remove the offending illustration and text. In our cosy western world, we should never take free speech for granted, especially if it concerns art.John FinlayEdinburgh

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Chinas censorship reaches far beyond its own borders - The Guardian

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Daily Archives: September 3, 2022

To Save the Deep Ocean, We Should Mine the Moon – Nautilus Magazine

Someone Wonders What’s The Most Ridiculous Reason Your Child Had A Meltdown? And 50 Parents Give Hilarious Answers – Bored Panda

Cruise Lines That Don’t Require a COVID-19 Vaccination – Cruise Fever

Buh bye, buffets? Heres what its like to cruise now – The Boston Globe

VATICAN – Seminar of formation for 80 new Bishops of the territories of first evangelization – Agenzia Fides

Faucis Red Guards: The Mass Censoring of Social Media – Brownstone Institute

Dip Salvador says, "Censorship Blocks Creative Output" – The Hype Magazine

100 Years Ago: How Hollywoods Early Self-Censorship Battles Shaped the MPA – Hollywood Reporter

Will Ethereum 2.0 be vulnerable to censorship? Industry professional explains – Cointelegraph

Chinas censorship reaches far beyond its own borders – The Guardian

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