Category Archives: Hedonism

On a crisp November night in 2016, I stumbled upon a message from John Piper that changed my theological and ministerial trajectory forever.

I was an eager high school senior with a passion for (what I perceived to be at the time) Big God theology. At this point in my life, I had spent a year following Jesus and serving my local church. I had been powerfully converted the summer before despite having grown up in a flagship independent Baptist church in Fort Worth.

It was my earnest and genuine goal to tell as many people as I could about what God had done for me in snatching me from the pit of legalism and dead religion. While I continued to have a cordial relationship with the pastor of this church, I openly admitted that I was grateful that God saved me not only from my sin, but from much of the ruinous theology of the fundamentalist movement.

On that November night, I was walking around praying and thinking on these things when I pulled out my phone and saw the following sermon in one of my podcast feeds: Helping Each Other Endure to the End. It is still one that I will listen to whenever I have lost sight of the vision of the ministry to which I believe God has called me.

The sermon was preached by John Piper at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis on Jan. 15, 1984. It is an exposition of Hebrews 3:12-14: Take care, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we share in Christ, if only we hold our first confidence firm to the end.

It was in this sermon that I was first exposed to the works of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. This would eventually lead me to discovering the Bekennende Kirche, the Barmen Declaration, and the works of Karl Barth, Karl Rahner, Hans Urs von Balthasar and Jrgen Moltmann.

Commenting on Bonhoeffers compelling vision for a united Christian community, Piper remarks, These words about life together have the ring of authenticity for us because they were written not at the nerve center of comfort but on the brink. They have the taste of radical commitment that all of us dream about, many of us crave, and only a few pursue.

It was then that I was firmly convinced that Jesus truly meant what he said and said what he meant.

For the next few years, I imbibed Piper daily. His Ask Pastor John podcast, his Sermon of the Day, and his Look at the Book video series all regularly made their way into my eyes and ears. He even answered one of my questions months before I graduated high school. As time passed, my theological trajectory continued to change ever so slightly with each passing college course, small group or personal discovery. I no longer identified myself as a Christian Hedonist or consumed content from DesiringGod, but, in my navet, I had a deep respect for Pastor John.

Nearly five years have passed since that night, and now one thing has become heart-wrenchingly clear to me: As I slowly drifted away from fundamentalism, John Piper dived in headfirst.

As I slowly drifted away from fundamentalism, John Piper dived in headfirst.

In my fundamentalist upbringing, for example, I had been taught that women do not have authority over their own bodies. This was not only a misquotation of Scripture, but a blatant deletion of words from 1 Corinthians 7:4: The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife.

In my fundamentalist upbringing, I had been taught that God intended for all the races to be separate. This could be seen easily in the story of the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11 and the Mark of Cain in Genesis 4. And besides, marrying across the races was just asking for trouble! Conspicuously absent from this racial discourse was the Apostle Johns vision of Heaven recorded in Revelation 7:9: After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb.

I learned about American exceptionalism and the precious foundation on which our country was built. Psalm 32:12 was cited often: Blessed is the nation whose god is the LORD. And yet it would be many years before I finally learned that such exceptionalism was antithetical to the gospel we claimed to believe because, The LORD detests all the proud of heart (Proverbs 16:5a). It also seemed particularly convenient that national calls to repentance included expositions on the sinfulness of abortion and homosexuality, but unjust wars, racism and the plundering of the poor and the earth remained unaddressed.

I soon felt horror when I learned what Piper infamously said of wives being abused by their husbands. He quipped, If its not requiring her to sin, but simply hurting her, then I think she endures verbal abuse for a season, she endures perhaps being smacked one night.

I soon felt horror when I learned what Piper infamously said of wives being abused by their husbands.

I was shocked when I discovered that Piper does not believe it is biblical and within the confines of complementarian theology for a woman to pray or read Scripture in church. This is despite the fact that the Apostle Paul makes provisions for it in 1 Corinthians 11.

I was revulsed when Piper suggested that while there is something sexually stimulating about muscular women, it probably means the sexual encounter that such an image would lead to is something very hasty and volatile, and in the long run unsatisfying.

So then, I was entirely unsurprised when Piper recently published a 1,200-word apologia of his slaveholding hero, Jonathan Edwards. At the risk of redundancy (or worse, self-plagiarism), I must admit that my assessment of his piece is identical to my previous assessment of similar remarks regarding slaveholders from another Baptist theologian: It is as tone-deaf as it is misguided. It reeks of a paucity in percipience.

Piper writes of Edwards, No one had lifted my view of God as high as Edwards had. And as far as I could see, this vision of God served to crush my own bent toward self-exaltation. It was unfathomable to me that anyone should think I was being set up by Edwards to have the mind of a slaveholder.

Pipers defense of Edwards is, most fundamentally, an exercise in utilitarian and egoist ethics.

Truly this statement is, as Piper himself concedes, the epitome of wishful thinking. Pipers defense of Edwards is, most fundamentally, an exercise in utilitarian and egoist ethics. Pipers justification for his designation of Edwards as a humble slaveholder is grounded in Pipers own personal experiences with the Edwardsian corpus, and not the objective nature of morality and the classical Christian ethical criterion of the inherent goodness of an action.

But you need not take my word for it, for this is Pipers own admission:

I do not wish for one of my heroes to be more tarnished than he already is . Whatever explanation I might give for why Edwards did not see his way clear to the renunciation of slaveowning at his moment in history, one thing I cannot deny: Fifty years of reading and pondering Edwards has been for me more heart-humbling, more Christ-exalting, more God-revering, more Bible-illuminating, more righteousness-beckoning, more prayer-sweetening, more missions-advancing, and more love-deepening than any other author outside the Bible.

In other words, it cannot possibly be the case that Edwards was as deviant and problematic as our minority brothers and sisters have cried out in reply to his appellation of Precious Puritan. Why? Because of John Pipers personal benefit. The ethical criterion by which we determine the goodness of a thing is self.

This, however, should not come as a surprise, particularly because Pipers entire philosophy of ministry is inextricably linked to his personal feelings a Christian strain of Hedonism. After all, God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him. Does it bring you spiritual satisfaction? Then it must be good!

This, however, does not even begin to unearth his theological rot. Piper steps to depths lower than these.

Par for the course for a Baptist minister, I will shamelessly alliterate this as Pipers perennially postmodern pet project. This, however, does not even begin to unearth his theological rot. Piper steps to depths lower than these.

Piper opines later in the piece, The New Testament ordered human relationships in Christ in such a way as to transform the master-slave relationship into something so different from owner and property that what remained was no longer recognizable as slavery in the traditional sense. And yet, Piper alleges that although the New Testament ethic was transformative, it did not say in so many words, There are no more master-slave relations in the church.

Piper has demonstrated grave errors in his theological judgment. Chief among these is that his rhetoric is identical to those of chattel slavery apologists. Because (so goes the argument) an explicit call to abolition never was given in the New Testament, but explicit instructions to masters and slaves do occur in the household codes, slavery is a divine hierarchical relationship that must be righteously ordered.

Pipers assertion would be cogent were it not for the fact that it is a bald-faced lie. The simple fact of the matter is that the New Testament does, in fact, not only abolish the master-slave distinction in the church, but annihilate it.

Pipers assertion would be cogent were it not for the fact that it is a bald-faced lie.

How Pipers reasoning stands up to the witness of inspired Scripture is beyond me. The Apostle Paul wrote Galatians 3:28 under the inspiration of the Spirit, There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. He, with the authority of the Risen Christ, commanded the Corinthians not to become slaves of men because they were bought at a price (1 Corinthians 7:23). Enslavers were condemned as not according with sound doctrine (1 Timothy 1:10).

But these words do not matter to Piper. One of the great, tragic and lasting ironies of Pipers ministry is that his voluntaristic view of God and utilitarian ethics are every bit as self-exalting, God-demeaning and theologically myopic as the caricature of Arminianism he claims to reject. I say this as a minister in the broad stream of the Reformed, Evangelical and Baptist traditions.

For Piper, the game is over before it has even begun. His theological assumptions and hermeneutical presuppositions yield a foregone conclusion of hierarchy wherein image-bearing Black and brown human beings and abused women are unwitting victims of Providence. To demand dignity and equality is an affront to the order of a capricious God in whose unstable and whimsical hands we must place our lives.

This is why he believes wives should endure being beaten by their husbands. It is why the slaveholding legacy of his heroes is so insignificant to him. It is why he has defended the new president of Bethlehem College and Seminary, who believes empathy is a sin. And, ultimately, it is why the church he served for all those decades saw his successor resign in the wake of elders accusing him of preaching a social gospel after the death of George Floyd.

His destructive theology is, at present, paying the piper.

Like his old friend in Louisville, John Piper has sold his proverbial birthright for a bowl of porridge. Like his hero Jonathan Edwards, his legacy is tainted and his theology is forever compromised by his personal failings. Pipers abysmal lack of care and empathy will perpetually enjoin him to that ever-growing list of Christian celebrities whose fall will bring immeasurable hurt to innumerable sheep in Christs fold.

Tragically, any good a person may derive from his voluminous theological and pastoral contributions is hidden behind an insurmountable pile of double-speak, hypocrisy, compromise, innuendo, inconsistency and incoherence. In the words of Frederick Douglass, Pipers religion is the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.

What started my journey with John Piper has now ended my journey with John Piper.

What started my journey with John Piper has now ended my journey with John Piper an intense desire to embody and participate in the presence-mediating, kingdom-furthering and world-renewing redeemed community of Jesus Christ.

Bonhoeffers theology has stood the test of time and continues to tower above the pygmies because he understood something Piper has yet to grasp: So often Christians, especially preachers, think that their only service is always to have to offer something when they are together with other people. They forget that listening can be a greater service than speaking. All that remains when hierarchy replaces compassion and order replaces empathy is empty spiritual chatter and clerical condescension which chokes on pious words.

No truer words have been spoken about Pipers abysmal finish in Christian ministry. And so, I bid him farewell.

David Bumgardneris known to those attending this years SBC annual meeting as The A/C Guy because of his moment of fame at a microphone. He is a 22-year-old senior at Texas Baptist College, theologian-in-training, evangelist and content creator from Fort Worth, Texas. He is passionate about gospel-focused theology and Christ-centered expository preaching. He is a member and minister at Cornerstone Baptist Church in Arlington, Texas, where Dwight McKissic is pastor. Follow him on Twitter@david_bumg.

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It's time to pay the Piper Baptist News Global - Baptist News Global

Tim Van Schmidt

(Part 2 of a 3 Part Series)

I saw my first hippie in 1967 thanks to my dad.

Our family had moved from Illinois to Phoenix, Arizona and we went on the classic American road trip to explore the west station wagon, trailer, tents, and all.

When passing through San Francisco, my father announced we were going to take a drive to see what it is really like.

He was referring to the world of the hippies, a weird, wild, and hairy subculture, fueled on rock and roll and a robust hedonism that had become national news. So we drove our family station wagon right through the Haight Ashbury district known as the epicenter of the hippie phenomenon peering out the windows at the crazy urban hubbub outside.

My mothers window was down and all of a sudden, a real live hippie leaped off of the sidewalk and tried to hand her an underground newspaper he was promoting. My mom fairly well screamed, rolling up her window and locking her door. She hadnt taken the newspaper.

I ended up buying my first peace button later that day at Fishermans Wharf.

By 1969, the hippie culture was at its apex. It wasnt just a city street you could drive down; it was a massive juggernaut influencing style, music, media, and politics.

The Woodstock Music and Art Fair in Bethel, New York on August 15-18 52 years ago this week has become the symbol of that time, at least for the hippie culture.

A lot of that has to do with the success of the 1970 documentary that followed the event itself all you have to do is just say Woodstock to conjure up the legend of massive crowds of peaceniks jamming together in harmony thanks to that film.

The recent Hulu release, Summer of Soul, a documentary celebrating a series of concerts in Harlem in the summer of 1969, refers to that roster of events as The Black Woodstock. And that inspired me to go back and check out the original.

There is plenty of footage out there if you are interested in Woodstock lore including a 2019 TV documentary, Woodstock, Three Days That Defined a Generation. I opted to pull out a copy of the original 1970 documentary release, Woodstock, running at just over three hours. There is also an expanded directors cut version, Woodstock 3 Days of Peace & Music, clocking in at 4 hours plus.

I could fill the rest of this column with the musical magnitude of this movie. What can I do but name names Santana, Ten Years After, Jimi Hendrix, Richie Havens, The Who, Joe Cocker and so many more? Woodstock is a mighty documentary and reveals that the new music and the new culture of the hippies had grown to gargantuan proportions in 1969 much bigger than even the savviest businesspeople among them were ready for.

According to legend, attendees of the Woodstock festival overcame overwhelmed event infrastructure and volatile weather to come together to enjoy live music and each other without major incident, despite the crowds that made local residents feel they were being invaded.

But lets add that Woodstock was not the only rock festival happening in 1969. In fact, there were festivals happening all over the country Palm Springs, Toronto, Denver, Atlanta, Seattle, Vancouver, New Orleans, Miami all summer long. Woodstock just had all the right pieces in place especially copious amounts of professional-level film and sound to make it legendary.

1969 was also the year of the ill-fated Altamont festival held in December. After the euphoric high of Woodstock, its worth viewing Gimme Shelter, another documentary that helps reflect a different part of the hippie world in 1969, which wasnt so much about rainbows and unicorns.

Gimmer Shelter is a documentary following the Rolling Stones 1969 tour and their efforts to headline a free concert at the Altamont Speedway in California at the end of the year.

On paper, it sounds like a West Coast Woodstock Santana, The Rolling Stones, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, all playing for free to a massive crowd but it turns out to be everything Woodstock was not. Violence turns it ugly, injuring performers and killing at least one attendee not far from the stage.

Blame for it could be laid at the feet of the Hells Angels hired to do security by the stage. Unruly fans in the crowd could also be to blame. Whatever the cause, in this case, the stars did not align for a peaceful event and it provides a somber, reality check to the story of 1969, the year the hippies had declared their own nation.

Tim Van Schmidt is a writer and photographer based in Fort Collins. Check out his YouTube channel at Time Capsules by Tim Van Schmidt.

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1969: The Rise of Woodstock Nation - North Forty News

Cynthia Spencer, Countess Spencer

National Portrait Gallery / Wikimedia Commons

A pair of unique dancing purses that once held the lipstick and compact of Diana, Princess of Wales' grandmother, Countess Spencer, are up for auction in Cambridge.

The rare items, which are called 'ncessaires', would have been used by the Countess during dances and other social occasions. While one is made from 9ct gold and constructed in chain maille, the other is a gilt metal in a similar style, with both estimated to fetch 1,000-1,500.

A mesh style dance purse, owned by Cynthia, Countess Spencer

Cheffins

Explaining the significance of the sale, Steven Collins, Jewellery, Silver and Watches Specialist at Cheffins says: 'Since the Roaring Twenties many of the fine jewellers and fashion houses have produced delicate evening bags and vanity cases known as ncessaires. They were small, usually hard-sided boxes, often exquisitely decorated and designed to contain such things as a powder compact, lipstick, comb, mirror, note card and pencil. Some also had separate sections to hold book matches and individual cigarettes. These came about in the time of hedonism; air travel, cocktail parties, Hollywood and excitement and these became the new must-have item of any self-respecting lady of the time and typified the optimism and new found freedoms for women of the era.

'Ncessaires are rare to the auction market and are collected mainly by those who buy powder compacts and other dressing table items, or by followers of a certain jewellery maker from a certain period. The fine Art Deco varieties made of precious metals and with gemstones are very desirable, but often people here are collecting designs by the maker, rather than the item. The ultimate in desirability for these are from the mid-1920s, made by some of the biggest names of the period such as Cartier, Boucheron or Chaumet. With these items, its all about both maker and provenance. Anything with a royal or celebrity link will add to its cachet and can increase the value exponentially.'

The 7th Earl Spencer with Cynthia and their son Edward John Spencer at Eton College, 1937

Topical Press Agency / Hulton Archive / Getty Images

Born Cynthia Ellinor Beatrix Hamilton in 1897, she married Viscount Althorp in 1919, and became the then Queen Elizabeth's Lady of the Bedchamber in 1937. When the Queen's daughter, previously the Princess Elizabeth, ascended to the throne, Cynthia continued to work for the now Queen Mother, until her death.

Also in the sale is a purse that belonged to Diana's aunt, Lady Anne Spencer, emblazoned with 'Anne' and engraved with 'From household staff, Althorp, 4th August 1941', leading the auctioneers to speculate it was a 21st birthday present.

One of the dance purses to be sold at auction, owned by Lady Anne Spencer

Cheffins

Available at the Cheffins Jewellery, Silver and Watches Sale 26 August at Cheffins in Cambridge.

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Two dance purses that once belonged to Princess Diana's grandmother Countess Spencer are up for auction - Tatler

The Swinging Sixties was a momentous time for music and society as a whole. The only other period of time it can be linked to is the Roaring Twenties. The second decade of the twentieth century was an equally significant decade, one characterised by hope, hedonism and groundbreaking advancements in fashion and music. In fact, the 20s are most often referred to as the Jazz Age, which gives you a definitive flavour of the time.

Looping back to the initial point, though, on both sides of the Atlantic, the 60s characterised nothing short of a tectonic shift in society. Now known often disparagingly as the Baby Boomers, the young hopeful generation that spearheaded this wave were spurred on by technological advancements that allowed their ideas to be fully realised something that the libertines of the 20s were not duly afforded.

If you cast your mind back and pick out the key moments/icons of the 60s, you will see that the era is brimming with crucial historical moments and figures. The first man on the moon, Beatlemania, The British Invasion, Woodstock 69, the assassinations of both JFK and Martin Luther King, all whilst the spectres of the Vietnam and Cold Wars loomed large over it all.

The music soundtracked the events, just as the events informed the music. The Beatles came to embody the ethos of the generation with All You Need Is Love, and Jimi Hendrix pioneered electric guitar playing. However, as the decade was marred by varying degrees of struggle, there was a dark side to it all, from which music could not escape. If we shift our focus to the death of the Rolling Stones founder,Brian Jones, which was attributed to misadventure, therein lies our point.

A decade of pushing the boundaries of things thats limits hadnt yet been discovered, mainly drug abuse, the 60s paved the way for everything that followed, musically and otherwise. It is easy to categorise any event from the 60s into one of two camps, adventure or misadventure. Music and popular culture were indeed taken on a groundbreaking odyssey by groups such as The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, among others but suffered many casualties. If you note the members of the notorious 27 club, this rings true, Jones and Hendrix ranking among them.

Another of these casualties wasPink Floyds founder and guitarist, Syd Barrett. Not a member of the 27 club by a long shot, the shaggy-haired genius would still find himself on the receiving end of the decades more sinister side. He was nothing short of a tormented soul, whose experiments with LSD are widely signified to have pushed his fragile ideation over the edge. To get a flavour of it, one can dip into any point on the Floyds 1967 debut,The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, to heed this.

Embodying an early warning of the dangers of extensive drug abuse and the need for support of mental health issues,Syd Barretts departure from Pink Floyd in April 1968 is regarded as a significant point in the bands long career. The succession of guitarist and vocalist David Gilmour in December 1967 would take the band to unprecedented heights both commercially and artistically.

However, as this period was one of perpetual shoulder-rubbing, there was another iconic musician who was touted by Pink Floyd as Barretts natural successor. In 2005, drummer Nick Mason revealed all in his autobiographyInside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd.The rhythmic maestro recalled that the band wanted Jeff Beck to replace Barrett on guitar, but none of us had the nerve to ask him.

The thought of the virtuoso Beck in Pink Floyd is dizzying; as one of the most iconic guitarists du jour, this would have been a brilliant and exciting combination. However, given that Beck has always followed his own path, doubts have been cast on this combination working out, and the marriage of Pink Floyd with school friend David Gilmour is something that cannot be understated.

In fact, in a 2010 conversation with Alice Cooper,Beckweighed in on the situation. In the discussion, Cooper told Beck that the band were too afraid of asking him to join them, to which he replies, How incredible is that? I never even thought they would have given me the light of day. How strange.

Whilst the thought of Beck in Pink Floyd might get you excited, it is just one of many examples of the revolving doors of music in that raucous time. Beck would receive many such offers in his career, but that is a story for a different day.

Watch Jeff Beck discuss Pink Floyd, below.

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The icon that Pink Floyd initially wanted to replace Syd Barrett - Far Out Magazine

On Saturday evening, with mud splattered up my legs and rain plopping into my can of San Miguel, bopping up and down to the spectral Apricots by the electronic duo Bicep, under a rainbow, I was struck by a sense of relief.

It was my overwhelming feeling at Wilderness my first festival in two years rather than the euphoria, anxiety, or trepidation that I had imagined, returning to that vivid, busy, unpredictable world.

Relief, that the crowds felt so safe and so normal; relief, that live arts are back with such fervour and joy; relief to be in nature, the safety of which we clung to those months when it was all we had left.

Wilderness began 10 years ago, in the sloping hills of Cornbury Park in Oxfordshire, and its Cotswold location, wonderland site (deer gallop in the fields, a tiny lake offers wild swimming and boating, late-night DJs host raves in a mystical tree-canopied valley) and boutique size and feel have a reputation for attracting the well-heeled.

Even with this weekends downpours, and after the pandemic hit pause on hedonism, this was still about as civilised as a festival might get a spa, fancy dress cricket, literary panels with as much emphasis on fine dining and wellness as on the music (the festival has its own orchestra).

The hottest tickets were a talk by Philip Pullman, at which drenched fans teemed out of the long round tent to hear him disparage the education system, and the rowdy sit-down banquets (I gave a standing ovation to chef Jay Morjaria after eating smoked brawn dumplings and kimchi and offal fried rice at the Flank Fire Feast).

A sense of communal delight and unity, sitting at long tables with strangers for the first time in years, was unexpectedly, almost spiritually, moving. For a friend of mine far more actively seeking enlightenment, that soul fulfilment came from daily paddleboard yoga, astrology sessions, wild swimming, intention-setting, and flower-crown weaving.

The music offered catharsis of a different kind no matter that Croydon rapper Loyle Carners beats are languid and pared-back nor that DJ and The xx frontman Jamie XX leaned on sparse samples, only breaking into climax at the very end (with his sirenic, looping hit gosh, to puffs of Technicolor smoke) it was a thrill to move in a crowd for the first time.

Northern Irish Bicep upstaged those headliners with exciting lightshows and juddering beats that could have taken us long into the night, while London electropop star Georgias energy was unmatched. She marvellously vanquished the torrential rain that diluted her audience, bashing drums alone on stage, conjuring menacing rhythm and cascading synths with her hit About Work the Dancefloor, hurling drumsticks into crowd like a rebel javelin thrower.

Lets sing loud enough so Kate can hear us she said, introducing her cover of Kate Bushs Running Up That Hill: aside from Rudimentals closing set, it was the closest the main stage audience came to a rousing chorus this was a line-upcurated for dancers.

Festivals have been one of the arts worlds greatest casualties in this pandemic: several postponed two years in a row, many more were called off last-minute due to insurance concerns, and others have had lineups thinned after acts were called to isolate.

Wilderness is only the second major festival, after Latitude, to get the green light (outside government pilot schemes) this year and for artists, organisers, and vendors it has been the hardest to pull together. That it went ahead, safely, and with such curiosity, mischief, confidence and heart was a triumph and a relief.

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Wilderness Festival 2021, review: What a joy and a relief it is to dance again - iNews

11/08/2021 - Bonifacio Angius returns to the Locarno Film Festival to present his latest, quirky feature film, painting a comical and decadent portrait of masculinity which is on the verge of implosion

Bonifacio Angius and Michele Manca in The Giants

Seven years after the success of Perfidia[+see also: trailerfilmprofile], Italian director Bonifacio Angius has once again been selected for the Locarno Film Festival, on this occasion the International Competition, where he is presenting his latest, surreal and ferociously independent feature film The Giants[+see also: trailerinterview: Bonifacio Angiusfilmprofile], signing his name to the movies direction, screenwriting, photography, editing and production. What distinguishes this most recent work of his is the freedom with which he tells the story, which is full of fury and anger but also tenderness, fragility, irony and dark humour. The Giants is an intense and unsettling film which explores the consequences of wanting (or having) to belong to the hegemonic male grouping, of having to renounce your own weaknesses in the name of privileges which would otherwise lie out of reach.

A get-together between old friends who share an excessive passion for artificial paradises, a deteriorating villa lost in the middle of the countryside, and an insatiable thirst for living in the present and momentarily forgetting the wounds of a past which hangs around their necks like a millstone: this, in short, is the world of The Giants. This diverse group of friends decides to spend what might be their last evening together in an atmosphere of unbridled hedonism: drugs, alcohol and dark, Nietzsche-style, pseudo philosophical discussions; an evening occasionally reminiscent of the bombastic world of La Grande Bouffe by Marco Ferreri (another director who made hegemonic masculinity his primary target) and the razor-sharp wit of Aki Kaurismki; an evening which will see masks fall to reveal real faces (or should we say grimaces) and inner worlds free from the constrictions of a society which values men above all else, real men who are untouchable and cold as ice. The Giants might be described as an ode to impotence; impotence of a social rather than a sexual kind, which drives the characters to reveal their own weaknesses and wounds, potentially for the first and last ever time; impotence which turns into a destructive but also a cathartic strength, no longer seen as a flaw to be cured via excessive doses of blue-coloured pills. With The Giants, Bonifacio Angius seems to want to confront us with a masculinity thats teetering on extinction, having fallen victim to its own sad privileges.

The films five characters, played with zest and realism by a cast of high calibre actors (Stefano Deffenu, Riccardo Bombagi, brothers Michele and Stefano Manca [alias Pino e gli Anticorpi] and the director himself), each have a singular way of approaching life: ignoring it after a first devastating disappointment in love, tackling it with abyss-like levels of anger, only indulging in its artificial side, thinking too much about it, or, contrarily, accepting its flaws. What unites the five friends, in spite of their clear differences (and drug dependency aside), is their inability to find an escape route or any kind of short cut which will allow them to escape the vicious circle of egoism and toxic masculinity. Cooped up in a villa which seems to imprison them within their own hallucinatory delusions, our five anti-heroes are no longer able (perhaps they never were able) of translating their anxiety into words. Instead, they become victims of it, bodies which are slowly consumed by the weight of emotions burning inside of them like a sacred fire. Despite philosophical ravings which sometimes border on pretentious, The Giants is a film which bravely reveals the darker side of giants who have been turned into monsters by society.

The Giants is produced by Il Monello Film (Italy) and is sold worldwide by Coccinelle Film Sales.

(Translated from Italian)

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Review: The Giants - Cineuropa

Sorry mate, thats just way too long its felt like forever! Summer 2019 may seem like a decade ago but outdoor music action is back on the cards again and we cannot wait.

Newcomers to the festival scene Gateways took a nice cheeky gamble by not cancelling back in spring time and boy did it pay off. Every punter partied like it would be their last. Every band played like their lives were at stake we were all happy to be back and this is what we loved:

There must have been 30mm of precipitation during Ian Broudie and cos set but nobody cared. The poncho party was in full flow and those with wellies on were clearly very pleased with themselves. After a magical set which culminated with a trio of Sugar Coated Iceberg, The Life of Riley, and Pure, Broudie announced, We have time for one more any requests? Cue Three Lions and at which point Skipton became Bedlam and the festival climaxed.

From Echo Park to Aireville Park Feeder were mint although following Three Lions must have felt like Mission Impossible. Taka Hiroses prominent bass lines had the soaking wet crowd pogo sticking amongst a stunning North Yorkshire backdrop. Treats included Buck Rogers, Tallulah and the timeless lyrics of Im going out for a while, So I can get high with my friends. Feeder were very happy to be back.

Maths always comes into music and the toilet to crowd ratio is more important today than Pythagoras Theorem. I can honestly say that in almost 25 years of festivaling, never has it been so quick and easy to make room for some more lager. Literally zero queues a weak bladder heaven.

The Skipton Building Society award for Best Frontman went to Scouting For Girls Roy Stride. Stride chatted with the crowd freely and had the left half competing with the right half like it was an Olympic event. Killer single Elvis Aint Dead flowed into then out of Elvis Presleys Cant Help Falling In Love then later on the band raised serotonin levels with a majestic cover of Whitneys I Wanna Dance With Somebody. It was pure joy.

Big Stu was single handedly knocking out acoustic anthems whilst attractive females drank gin not a bad combo. Whats the difference between humans and animals? he asked us. This was not a science lesson but a cheeky intro to his rendition of The Bloodhound Gangs Bad Touch. Stu you were class pal. Sorry we had to leave but Razorlight were coming on.

Johnny Borrell and co proper smashed it. Armed with an inventory of anthems, Razorlight knocked out classics such as Stumble and Fall, Golden Touch, In The Morning, Somewhere Else, America, and Before I Fall To Pieces now that is some bag of tricks. They were beautiful and hedonism imploded; at least fifteen minutes of it felt like divine intervention. The only bad thing was it meant the end of the festival or did it...?

Just as you thought it was game over, the festival organisers had one last treat for us all a gunpowder plot that gave Sydney Harbour a run for its money. It was a captivating end to a successful maiden voyage for Gateways Festival. If you didnt think it was a belter then you deserve to wait another two years until your next fest.

Photo by Liam Atkinson

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7 Things We Loved About Gateways Festival 2021 Review - UK Festival Guides

The return of restaurants. The season of hedonism. The summer of New York City. Theres no shortage of names for whats unfolding in the once-yurt-laden streets of New York, but Nicole Biscardi thinks there might be room for one more. This is the start of the restaurant renaissance, says Biscardi, a hospitality industry specialist with the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce.

In July 2020, when the five boroughs became an epicenter for coronavirus globally, city officials struggled to document the number of restaurant closings across the city there were just that many. Roughly a year later, the opposite is now true: New York City is experiencing one of its busiest seasons for restaurant openings in over a year. Even if its not all that busy.

Restaurant openings are on the rise again in New York City, but viewed through the lens of pre-pandemic openings data, the renaissance looks more like a slow recovery. People might think restaurants are blowing the doors off, making money hand over fist, opening left and right, but they dont realize how devastated the industry was, Biscardi says. Even though it looks and feels like things are back, theyre still not.

Close to 700 restaurants opened their doors between March and May 2021, according to the latest available data from Yelp, but more than 1,000 opened over that same period in 2019. In May, typically one of the years busiest months for restaurant openings, the number of new openings dropped by 300 restaurants from 2019 to 2021.

Restaurant reservation company Resy estimates that roughly the same number of businesses opened on its platform between April and June 2021 as during that same period in 2019. However, the companys reach has more than doubled in recent years, from roughly 2,000 restaurants in late 2018 to more than 5,000 the following year, suggesting that openings have not kept pace with the companys growth.

Even so, its an encouraging uptick after a year that brought even the citys busiest seasons for restaurant openings to a halt. Over the last year, Biscardi says she has monitored restaurant openings across the city, surveying a caseload of more than 600 businesses grappling with seasonal weather and shifting regulations. In the fall, when indoor dining briefly returned to New York City, there was panic about how vaguely worded state policies would play out in reality, she says. After indoor dining shut down two months later, most of the restaurateurs she spoke with were hysterically crying, unsure if their businesses would make it through the winter.

By spring, coronavirus restrictions had started to loosen, and something became apparent, Biscardi says. Through a year of ups and mostly downs some restaurant owners were holding their breaths, planning new projects, and waiting to debut those that were already in the works before the pandemic. Now well into summer, restaurant openings are firing out like a shotgun, she says.

True, the number of restaurants that opened between March and May 2021 is down compared to 2019, but viewed year-over-year, the number of new food businesses is up by roughly 92 percent, according to data from Yelp. Between March and July, approximately 1,300 additional establishments applied for permits through the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, though that number also includes non-restaurant food businesses and renewals for existing restaurants.

Spring and fall were typically the busiest seasons for restaurant openings in pre-pandemic times, but the latest uptick in numbers is the culmination of a year-long bottleneck, according to Biscardi. Because of how long it can take to plan and open a restaurant, there were a lot of restaurants waiting in the pipeline, she says. When pandemic restrictions on restaurants and bars started to loosen, people that were even sort of ready to go said, Fuck it. Lets do it now.

Such is the case with Hand Hospitality, the hit-making group behind Her Name is Han and Izakaya Mew. Emboldened by the citys reopening, Hand debuted Little Mad in early June, a Korean-American restaurant in Nomad located in the former space of On, from the same group. Hand has plans to expand with a second restaurant next month, a Thai establishment that has been in the works for more than a year but was put on hold due to the pandemic.

The openings were spurred by a feeling that everything is slowly coming back, a spokesperson for the hospitality group tells Eater but also by a fear. If we dont do it now, how much later can we wait? they say.

Hand Hospitality repurposed its restaurant spaces, but elsewhere in New York City, openings are being spurred by fire sale rent deals made earlier in the pandemic, according to Andrew Moger, the founder of local sandwich chain the Melt Shop and real estate development company BCD. The things that are opening now are deals that were made during the pandemic, when rents were being discounted by 30 to 50 percent in some parts of the city, he says. Its not like you sign a lease now and you pop it up the next day. It takes time.

For operators with capital at their disposal earlier in the pandemic, investments are starting to pay off. Blank Street Coffee, which first opened in Williamsburg last August, now has a double-digit lineup of coffee carts and brick-and-mortar cafes under its belt. Founders Issam Freiha and Vinay Menda plan to open 20 additional locations in New York City by the end of the summer, they say, roughly a third of which will be brick-and-mortar.

We were the only bid most times, Menda says of rent deals made at this time last year. We had all the time in the world to decide what we wanted to do.

Those same opportunities are rarer today. Brandon Pena is the founder of Puerto Rican coffee roaster 787 Coffee, which nearly doubled its number of locations this past year from four to 11 by signing leases on cafe spaces that shuttered during the pandemic. He estimates rent prices have increased by roughly 20 percent from this time last year. Theres a lot of restaurants opening and everyones trying to get the best price, says Pena, who has been outbid on three cafe spaces in June alone.

Everything weve looked at, prices are up because they have offers now, he says. They used to not have anyone.

Restaurant spaces may be moving again, but experts say the New York City economy may still be years away from returning to pre-pandemic levels and could be slower to bounce back than other metropolitan areas in the country. Other factors, including the end of the states pause on commercial evictions on September 1 and the Restaurant Revitalization Fund running out, mean that an uptick in restaurant closings could be on the horizon.

Biscardi will be the first to say shes not a fear monger or an expert on citywide economics but as someone whos been on the ground with restaurant and bar owners over the past year, she believes were on the right path back, even if its a long one. Even under perfect circumstances everythings open, regulations are lifted, people want to go out I think were looking at another two to three years from now, she says.

Still, a renaissance is a relative, and Biscardi expects that restaurants and bars will continue to open their doors, especially as New York City inches toward its second busiest season for openings: the fall.

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A Record Number of Restaurants Are Opening in New York City. Sort Of. - Eater NY

Empty stadiums, no fans, and if you're an athlete it's probably best to avoid having sex in the Olympic Village just to be on the safe side.

No wonder, then, that the Tokyo 2020 Olympics has been forced to break with a number of traditions as the global pandemic forces organizers to mastermind a mega-sporting event unlikely any other.

There's quite a checklist of dos and don'ts for athletes, officials, media and volunteers attending the Games, given those Covid-19 countermeasures that have been in put in place to ensure the Olympics are "safe."

Spectators will also be absent from 97% of Olympic competitions, with "virtual cheering" and a screen at events for fans to send in selfies and messages of support to athletes instead.

While opinion polls have consistently highlighted the unpopularity of the Games among the Japanese public, organizers hope the focus will quickly move away from the global pandemic once the serious competition gets underway after Friday's Opening Ceremony.

Nonetheless, questions remain over how Tokyo can hold a massive sporting event and keep volunteers, athletes, officials -- and the Japanese public -- safe from Covid-19.

On Tuesday, a Japanese health expert warned the bubble around the Olympic village had "kind of broken," while Tokyo 2020 CEO Toshiro Muto said organizers weren't ruling out a last-minute cancellation of the Games amid rising Covid-19 cases.

That febrile environment has ensured that Tokyo has a tough task not to be the first 'no-fun' Olympics.

READ: Olympic athletes battle 'long Covid: 'I'm really struggling to exercise still'

The athletes' village at the Olympics Games is typically viewed as a place where thousands of the world's best athletes from more than 200 countries congregate and get to know each other a little bit better, as well as sharing stories and experiences.

It's even developed a reputation for hedonism, with one athlete describing it as "a pretty wild scene" and condom ambassadors on duty at the 2016 Rio Summer Games.

However, at this Games, organizers are asking athletes to dine alone and maintain social distancing from others. In a TikTok video on Wednesday, Australian water polo star Tilly Kearns detailed the team's rigorous health protocols in the village's canteen -- athletes are only allowed 10 minutes to eat their food.

Large numbers of condoms have been given out at the Games since the 1988 Seoul Olympics to raise awareness of HIV and AIDS. This year, organizers are planning to give away about 150,000 condoms -- but only once athletes check out.

Kunihiko Okamoto, vice president of Okamoto Industries, which was asked to supply some of the condoms by Games organizers, said the number of prophylactics was reduced due to the pandemic.

"Before the pandemic, we thought the Olympics are a great opportunity to showcase our products -- it is important to raise more awareness around STDs. But during the pandemic, and given the situation, we feel there are more important things in the world than talking about the importance of condoms," said Okamoto.

READ: Brisbane officially announced as host of 2032 Olympics

As athletes settle into their new accommodation at the Olympic Village, many are testing out what's on offer.

Paul Chelimo, a runner for Team USA, claimed on his Twitter account that the "beds to be installed in Tokyo Olympic Village will be made of cardboard, this is aimed at avoiding intimacy among athletes."

"Beds will be able to withstand the weight of a single person to avoid situations beyond sports," he added.

However, the idea that the beds with cardboard frames would be for "anti-sex" purposes and would collapse under the weight of more than one person was quickly debunked by one Olympic athlete.

Irish gymnast Rhys McClenaghan posted a video on Twitter of himself jumping up and down several times as he tested out his bed's sturdiness, before claiming: "It's fake! Fake news!"

Tokyo 2020 says the beds will be "turned into recycled paper after the Games."

"We are promoting the use of recycled materials for procured items and construction materials at the Tokyo 2020 Games," the Games' official "Sustainability Pre-Games Report," said.

READ: Six Polish swimmers sent back home from Tokyo following admin error

Despite the Covid-19 protocols, coronavirus cases in Tokyo -- currently under a state of emergency until August 22 -- show no signs of slowing.

Tokyo reported 1,832 new Covid-19 cases on Wednesday, its highest daily increase since January 16, according to Tokyo Metropolitan Government.

"Without the proper measures in place, it will only take one person to bring in the virus and spread it, especially in places like the athlete village," infectious disease expert Nobuhiko Okabe said at a news conference Friday.

"We have to do what we can to make sure an outbreak doesn't happen, and we really need the cooperation of all the athletes and delegations to make this work," he added.

Olympic organizers have not included any specifics about sex in the playbook outlining Covid-19 countermeasures, though social distancing protocols would make it more challenging.

But Maki Hirayama, a sociologist and expert on sexuality at Meiji University, argued athletes who've been preparing to compete at the Games will likely still be looking for ways to let off steam -- even amid the pandemic.

"(Humans) need a release, and all the top athletes of the Olympics had to focus on their training ... and we cannot live only with concentration; we need a release. Sexual activity can provide (people) the biggest release," she said.

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No fans or sex? Tokyo has tough task trying not to be the first 'no-fun' Olympics - Action News Now

YESTERDAY was the 10th anniversary of the death of Amy Winehouse. Ive just sat through another documentary that spins your head and heart around, making you wonder who (and what) was to blame for the singers terrible, sorrowful demise.

But before I re-enter that maelstrom, I am happy to begin in a more grounded place. In the London leg of my life, I do my vocal rehearsal days in a complex called Mill Hill Studios. There is an iconic stencil of Winehouse on the wall outside one of the rooms. Turns out, this was the place she started putting her bands together, and did so till the very end.

It is a lovely, well-kept environment, run by a variety of diamond-hearted geezers. They have their careful, tactful stories about Amy.

One of them tells how, just before her death, she was planning a very stripped back, jazz-tinted album, but as a four piece, drums, vox, bass and keys/guitar, with some sax or clarinet as appropriate. Basically, a step away from the big wall-of-sound production on Back in Black

And the talk is like that: all about musicianship, no psychodrama. As if the most respectful thing to do is to concentrate on the compositions and performances that came from her mouth, fingers, body and soul, for as long as we had her. And as for the rest Well, to be honest, it seems like theres a battle of blame narratives going on. Last nights BBC documentary Reclaiming Amy is primarily narrated by Amys mum, Janice Winehouse-Collins. It explicitly sets out to place the singer in circles of care, whether close family or friends, who were ultimately unable to handle her addictive condition.

Its clearly an attempt to answer the Oscar-winning 2016 documentary Amy. This film indicts the celebrity press, an exploitative and parasitic music business and to some degree her father, Mitch, as among those who failed to properly look after her.

I resist going much deeper into these minefields. It is undoubtedly the case that the absurd shock of her 27-year-old demise, and the size of the talent that was extinguished, sends out a spray of fragments (and protagonists). Kaleidoscopes will shuffle these testimonies around for decades. The potential patterns of responsibility (and evasions of it) are endless.

But the truth is also that Winehouses own art proceeded on the basis of cheeky, flirty but also shocking self-revelation. When her blockbuster album Back To Black came out in 2006, the rise of confessional culture and reality TV content (amplified by social media) was beginning its inexorable rise.

Big Brother was regnant on Channel 4, libido and drunkenness tumbling through each days programming. The music critic Alexis Petridis recently noted that Facebook opened to everyone over thirteen with a valid email address four weeks before Back to Blacks release; Twitters tipping point came five months later.

READ MORE:Runrig documentary There Must Be A Place offers insight into legendary band

So the world was ready for Winehouses artistic candour about her barely held-together lifestyle. (A final zeitgeist point might well be that these frothy jets of hedonism and confessionalism were being fuelled by oceans of credit all to come crashing down in the following 18 months).

But you maybe have to live inside some of her songs for a while, to realise how powerfully she conducts this open-heart surgery. For some of the festival sets were playing this year, Hue And Cry is putting a cover of Back To Black in the full-band songlist, graduating from a piano-vocal version.

Great pop songs can take you to another harsh world, but so beautifully that you can cope being there. What a world in Back To Black. We know, biographically, that Winehouse was in a dangerously co-dependent, half-open relationship with Blake Fielder-Civil, inspiring all of these songs.

The lineaments of that relationship are brutally laid out in the first lines: He left no time to regret/Kept his dick wet/With his same old safe bet. The second verse, like some kind of Camden Town John Donne, uses drug paraphernalia (the penny is a fragment of crack) as a metaphor for their blasted relationship: I love you much, its not enough You love blow and I love puff Life is like a pipe and Im a tiny penny Rolling up the walls inside How can you sing this as a man?

There are precedents. Sinatra was notorious for hanging out at Billie Holliday gigs, imagining himself taking the suffering role in her songs. Though if you shift the lyrics of Back To Black around and rewrite for the male role, the song goes even darker: a story of male power setting the parameters, observing the ruins, even amidst mutual brokenness.

Last nights BBC documentary certainly wants to reclaim Amy from any victim framing. Her excesses and appetites are mostly rendered as intrinsically motivated, not extrinsically triggered. Her closest male schoolfriend recalls her in escapades involving mooning bare bums and raised middle fingers.

Winehouses often tearful coterie speak of her physical fragility, but also her strong willpower, impervious to advice or intervention.

Her parents strongly assert that she was in the grip of addiction, as a disease and condition. They have even set up a foundation to assist the recovery of young addicts. When asked at an interview in her full bee-hived and flick-mascarad splendour about her fears, Amy answers: What am I scared of? Myself.

THOUGH I tend towards Winehouse not being the victim of her circumstances, there are some formative elements which most performers will recognise. The much criticised father, Mitch, himself a wanna-be wedding-band Sinatra working as a cab driver, was clearly a template for his performing daughter.

I enjoyed the limelight, I cant deny it, he says in the BBC doc. But Mitch also reveals that he tried, at the height of his daughters self-destruction, to have Amy sectioned (her charm sent the examining doctors away). The death of a beloved grandmother is also cited as a destabilising influence, as much as the standard explanation of drugs and drink. There was so much more, says her mum Janice. She resonated at a different frequency to anyone else. It often feels like the Amy we know has been lost.

Reclaiming Amy does enough of the necessary job of putting her performances and songwriting front and centre. In retrospect, shes an odd mix: cartoonish in her fashion choices, wriggling awkwardly like a teenager on a school dancefloor, but with a voice that erupts from her like lava, Aretha and Dinah and Ella and god knows who else comprising the flow. Yet the verbal scenes she paints come from bad romance, North-London style.

READ MORE:Pat Kane: Amy Winehouse wasnt lost in the music, she was lost to the music

Its obviously intriguing to envision a less fissile Winehouse, what she would have settled into. Adele-like serenity? One of the saddest moments in the BBC doc is when Amy sees her own future as a mother with a few kids, which her friends tearfully corroborate. One idly imagines that these might have been her next most beloved creations.

But theres a line from Rehab, that spookily defiant megahit about her resistance to all helpers, which I cant forget. Fleeing from the hands of experts and doctors, she trills: Theres nothing you can teach me/That I cant learn from Mr Hathaway. That, I presume, is the soul titan Donny Hathaway, whose covers she often took to entirely new levels in her performances.

Maybe this girl wasnt just lost in music, but lost to music. The business of show supports the flaming arcs of the mercurial and the unique. But often without a net. And often with the net being deliberately evaded. Rest in process, Amy Winehouse.

Reclaiming Amy is available now on BBC iPlayer

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Pat Kane: Amy Winehouse wasn't lost in the music, she was lost to the music - The National