]]> http://thelulznews.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/london-riots-2011/feed/ 0 thelulznews lulzeng lelzen luldenlulz1 lulzeny lundulz lulzden lulzden lulzden2 lulzen3 lulzen4 lulzen5 lulzen6 lulzen7 lulzen8 lulzen9 http://thelulznews.wordpress.com/2011/07/11/lulz-basics/ http://thelulznews.wordpress.com/2011/07/11/lulz-basics/#comments Mon, 11 Jul 2011 06:18:54 +0000 TLN http://thelulznews.wordpress.com/?p=573 ]]> Lulz: The root of all terrorism. If you’re an evil lulz seeking animal – from trolling to prison raep – after every action taken, you must make the epilogic dubious disclaimer: “I did it for the lulz.”

Lulz began as a plural variant of lol and can mean interesting or funny internet content. However; caution, these are often not simple lols but instead a corrupt lol under the influence of shadenfreude, or “the joy you feel when bad things happen to other people.”

Spontaneous celebration outside the White House following the presidents address.

This is going to be a new thing that I’m starting called That Just Happened. Anytime they kill Osama Bin Laden or something like that this is what I’m going to call it…

On May 1st 2011 President Obama lived the ultimate American dream, and that’s watching Osama Bin Laden get shot in the face. A conference room under the west wing of the White House, aka the “situation room,” had a real-time audio and video feed from the troops on the ground in Abbottabad, Pakistan when they killed the terrorist leader.

The mood was described as “tense” by someone who was there watching the operation unfold as it did like a god dam action movie. The mission was described as “something like the mission that inspired the movie Black Hawk Down, except way better.” A 24 man SEAL team using two helicopters infiltrated the million dollar compound in a nighttime air assault. In the end all 24 SEALs and Bin Laden’s lifeless body made it out in one helicopter. The other had to be disposed of after receiving damages in a ‘hard landing’. Three men who had taken up arms against the SEALs were also killed. Osama’s youngest wife was shot in the leg when she tried to rush the SEALs. She was captured along with 6-8 of her children and is now in Pakistani custody. Several other people were also bound at the hands as the highly trained assassins made their way through the compound. Now the President’s facial expression seems like the appropriate one in the room.

Thats his COD face

It has been a long time coming for Bin Laden as the FBI’s most wanted criminal since the attacks on September 11th 2001. The trail to Osama Bin Laden starts in an overseas prison in 2003 when heavily criticized Bush-era interrogation methods got the first lead, which was the alias of a trusted messenger for Osama. In 2007 more detainees in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba gave information that eventually lead to the real name of the trusted Bin Laden aid. From there we were able to follow the aid to the compound where Osama was killed. When we first got the lead in 2007 by the controversial ”waterboarding” interrogation method, then Senator Obama said he would support a covert strike to kill or capture Osama Bin Laden if we knew of his location — even if it was deep inside Pakistan.

The next significant interim step in the saga is a little out-of-place. In 2008 candidate Obama proposed to close down the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay and lead the chorus condemning the Bush administration for using “enhanced interrogation techniques.” The people agreed and much finger-wagging and shame was sent poor George’s way. Once Obama was elected he signed an executive order within the first 100 days of his presidency that would have shut down the prison at Guantanamo Bay. At the same time he ended the “war on terror” and renamed our military campaigns as “overseas contingency operations,” pulled out of Iraq, and changed the focus of the war in Afghanistan to again killing or capturing Osama Bin Laden and dismantling the Al Queda terrorist network.

"This might not work as an interrigation technique, but it will look sick as hell."

Now it looks like President Obama has changed his mind about the prison at Guantanamo and — even though no one is saying it — he has to give some credit to the Bush-era interrogation techniques. His initial pacifism towards the War on Terror worked nicely as a sort of smoke and mirror ploy to maybe grow complacency amongst the high valued targets in the Al Queda network. Especially interesting is the timeline of events that led up to the eventual killing of the most wanted man in the world, President Obama’s involvement as a senator, a candidate, and the Commander-in-Chief. Obama wanted to kill Osama because he thinks that will end the war in Afghanistan – which many people will disagree and say that it will not .

Secrecy was key in this operation and I’d really like to know if any of the Bin Laden intel is in the soposed “Wikileads secret file” that Assange was threatening to release a not long ago. It looks like we weren’t going to take any chances that they did. A week before the operation took place Wikileaks began releasing the first of its files on Guantanamo Bay.

At least we know the president and his staff are good at keeping secrets. Just hours before the attack, Obama and many other White House staff members who knew about the plan to finally get Bin Laden were present at the annual White House correspondents dinner. Here the President did a stand up performance roasting the crap out of Donald Trump and making a ton of jokes about the “birther” issue. It has been noted that the operation was initially planned for Saturday night, the same day as the dinner. It is amazing to see the President and his staff “keep cool” at the dinner and be able to joke and laugh while holding such an exciting secret. I especially liked the timing of The Presidents Speech spoof trailer at the end because the next day Obama would give the most remembered speech of his presidency, which is the address announcing the killing of Usama Bin Laden.

At 2:08 in this next clip you can see Seth Myers take a wise crack at the hunt for Usama Bin Laden as well as CSPAN. The President laughs at the joke, which isn’t particularly funny; suspicious much? Robert Gates also had a suspicious grin at the mention of the worlds most wanted criminal mastermind.

Twitter got its shine on once again as the news was first broke by first person sources over the social networking site. An Abottabad resident, who estimated that he was only two miles from the compound which was housing Osama Bin Laden, was awake at the time of the raid and described what he could hear on his Twitterfeed. He didn’t know what was going on but described hearing what sounded like a helicopter crash and wondering what it could have been. Shortly thereafter, the news broke and the President made his address.

Residents of Abottabad had no idea what was going on but maybe still had slightly more of a clue than say, the Pakistani military. President Obama and his intelligence team decided not to tell the Pakistani authorities about the operation over fear that an Al Quede mole might tip-off the target. The American SEAL Squadron of some 40 personel penetrated deep inside Pakistan, flying under the radar undetected. The Pakistani military or Intelligence service claims that they had no idea Usama was living in such a populated area, and quite close to a military establishment.

The sound of a helicopter crashing that was heard by this one vigilante, and now famous, Abottabad resident was probably the one helicopter that did crash, also the large explosion heard was most likely the SEAL team disposing of the crashed helicopter in the correct manner once it is incapable of flying.

There is a photo of the body of Usama Bin Laden at the time of his death as well as a video of his burial at sea. The white house has decided not to release any additional visual evidence at this time because of sensitivities. It is not clear whether photos would hurt or help conspiracy theorists and besides, everyone that needs to know Osama is dead already does — I.E. his associates in Al Quede. However, there is a pretty damn good counterfeit Osama death photo propagating around the web, but it is a fake and was around before all this started. I repeat this is not the real Osama death photo.

not osama bin laden

If someone links to this and says otherwise, punch them in the groin the next time you see them. The real photo will however look a lot like this so why not use it as a preview. Along with taking out the Most wanted fugitive on planet earth the seal team also obtained a treasure trove of documents, hard drives and other intelligence which was the terrorist leaders personal stash. He would have had information about all of Al Queda’s inner workings and current operations. Let’s hope that the Obama administration will respond to the encouragement they have received from across the globe and use the new information to end Al Queda once and for all.

Below is really a picture of Usama’s blood on the floor in the room he was killed, enjoy.

This really is his blood

Bear Grylls and Les Stroud are both hosts of TV shows on the Discovery Channel. Man vs Wild – known as Born Survivor in Englandland and Ultimate Survivor in far far away land — is hosted by Bear Grylls and specializes in parachuting, killing, rope/rock climbing, hiking and other such antics. Les Stroud, the Survivorman, also hosts a show that focuses on wilderness survival. Both are recognized survival experts and the design of their shows is to educate the viewer about what to do if you are by yourself in a wilderness survival scenario. Naturally the two experts are compared to one another and battle it out to the death for the title “worlds best survival expert,” because we all know there can only be one. Fans of television and the internet are going to go with Bear Grylls as their favorite 8 out of 10 times. Hardcore Discovery Channel fans (same people who say River Monsters is better than Man vs Wild and Surviviorman combined) are going to be more inclined to go with Les, causing a clash of the fans survival off like none other seen before over the internet.

Bear and Les film their episodes in the most inhospitable locations known to man. Les is from Canada so he doesn’t really mind the snow and has many episodes in arctic conditions. One in which he simulated a dogsledder who lost his run-away sled. Bear is from Ireland and perfers a temperate rocky terrain. There are some significant differences between the two survival experts and it may ultimately stem from their backround and where they come from. Bear is a former British SAS survival instructor and medic. Les is a survival instructor from Ontario who has a degree in music or some shit. Les began his documentarian career when he went to live in the remote Wabakimi area of Ontario, Canada for a year long “honey-moon.” The documentary of their adventure was later published as Snowshoes and Solitude and no it is not a porno.

Bear began appearing in deoderant commercials after becoming the youngest Briton to climb mount everest at age 23 only eighteen months after breaking his back in a parachuting accident, which ended his military career. He wrote a book about his ascent that made it to the top 10 best sellers list in the UK. His first TV appearance — besides a few deoderant commercials — was a documentary of a re-creation of the French Foreign Legion’s basic desert training in Sahara Africa.

Beyond Survival, Les’s other show, moved the genre forward and focuses on traditional group survival by  “seeking out the true masters of survival: the last indigenous tribes in the most remote corners of the planet… before they vanish forever.” Les still films the documentary style show entirely by himself, with full commentary.

As “Survivorman,” Les Stroud spent years surviving some of the most remote locations on earth – alone – while filming himself. In “Beyond Survival with Les Stroud,” he learns the tribes’ techniques, takes part in their rituals and ceremonies, and discovers the secrets of how these cultures have survived for thousands of years…before they vanish forever.

3. Les Stroud is completely alone when he goes out to demonstrate a survival scenario. Bear travels with a full film crew and there are rumors that he even stays in hotels at night and not in the wild. Les gets a lot of props for being able to demonstrate delicate survival techniques and actually be able to survive in a realistic scenario. At the same time Les is known to loose his mind while being completely alone in the middle of nowhere. All things considered he does a pretty amazing job with the filming, acting, and surviving. In order to get the correct theatrical framings Les has to go far out of his way to make it all look proffessional. He famously has to set up a camera and tape himself traveling through the scenery — like climbing a hill or descending into a valley – then walk back, grab the camera and walk through the same scenery again, sacrificing precious calories in the effort.

4. There’s a standing rule on Man vs Wild that watever fucked up insane gross terrifying insect that Bear comes across, he has to eat after explaining what species it is, whether or not it is poisones, and how to remove the poisones region. Stroud has also been known to eat fucked up shit but only when he is legitimatly starving and you can actually tell he’s excited to find sustenence. One thing that Bear and Stroud are also known to do is eat raw meat from fresh animal carcases. I can’t stress enough how much they follow the “all gross shit gets eaten” rule on Man vs Wild. It goes to the fear factor level and beyond, even sinister and horrifying in the way that Bear likes to drink the warm blood of a fresh kill straight from the juggular. No seriously, he once ate a yak eye-ball” just for fucks sake.”

Bear simply has an all around more creapy and violent vibe then Les “Survivorman” Stroud. There’s a pretty good chance that he would be able to kill any of us in our sleep without a second thought. It’s his raw enthusiasm for what he’s doing that puts Bear above and beyond Stroud in skill level and awesome factor.

Bear Grylls seen drinking the blood of his enemies

5.Bear Grylls once turned a dead seal into a wet-suit so he could swim from one island to another in freezing cold water. The list is long and fast of crazy insane shit that Bear has done. Some of the things he’s done multiple times. For instance, in nearly every episode a random snake will appear and Bear will catch it and bite its head off immediatly, regardless of whether or not the snake is deadly poisonous. When the snake bites back you can even see him enjoy killing it. For all those animal activists out there, your exactly right.

Quick, your mountain-climbing in the amazon — your helicopter runs out of fuel and you have to ditch — you land right in the middle of hostile clan territory and all you have to survive is a flint rock, the clothes on your back, an oozy, and your six authorized pokemon.

Bears Top Borneao memories

So right now Bear is looking a lot like the better survivor expert and is truly worthy of the title survivorman. This judgment is purely based off of their ability to entertain and educate. But think about it as if you had a choice between who you would like to be stranded with, and who you would have a bette chance or surviving yourself. When this is the question I would have to go with Les because he doesn’t come across as completely balls-out insane. Bear does things for the sole purpose of demonstrating the superiority he alone has over the environment. Les demonstrates how anyone else on planet earth — which is inhabited with pussey bitches when compared to Bear Grylls — would have to survive in the wild.

Bear dominates the wild with brute force and vatican assasin like killer precision. Les actually has to use his brain and think about stuff so he doesnt kill himself and end up like Grizzly Man. In this respect Les does sometimes seem the smarter one. You can find that four or more of Man vs Wild’s top 20 grosses things Bear has eaten or drank is urine. If your in the desert and your dying of thirst then you might have to drink your urine. I would recommend filtering it out the correct way like Les and not just chugging down warm fluid like Bear.

Bear just the adventurer. 

There is a Man vs Wild video game  Les Stroud writes books about survival that give good advice. You can take a quiz to see if you could survive like bear grylls. Bear Grylls has his own line of Gerber multi-tools. Ever wanted survival advice while on the go? There’s and app for that.

Are we losing our ability to think historically?  What does it mean to “think historically?”  History, as we know it, is the “formal record of the past” and is compiled and canonized by many historians, written about in many books and essays, and then taught accordingly.  Could our society be trying to write history almost as quickly as it unfolds?  Is the bias and manipulative nature of news networks from all sides of the spectrum contributing to a greater ignorance?  Are we being misled?  We know little more than what we are told.  September 11^th, 2001 changed this country forever.  We are approaching the 10 years anniversary of the event.  9/11 is a prime piece of recent history that can prove our historical inclinations are being tampered with.  The road to war was executed effortlessly.  People were angry and a want of revenge lingered.  It will be interesting to look at a modern, popularly circulated explanation of what “happened.”  Also, we will compare Kennedy’s address to the nation during the Cuban Missile Crisis to that of Bush’s after the attacks.

“BLAMM!” went Flight 77 when it hit the Pentagon, “R-RRUMBLE…” is what it sounded like when the South Tower collapsed, and “FLAMM!” belted Flight 93 when it hit the ground.  That’s just part of the excitement in The 9/11 Report A Graphic Adaptation by Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón, based off of a larger volume simply titled, The 9/11 Report by Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton.  The latter has been labeled the “official” account covering the event.  Rather than how most history books are written, waiting for a future context to maximize historical accuracy, the 9/11 Commission said, “Why wait?”  It didn’t take long for it to be adapted into the form of a graphic novel.  No other event in history was given an “official” narrative endorsed by the United States Government.  Not only that, but history contains no bias (or shouldn’t).  Al Qaeda should be as equally represented as the United States, it isn’t.

The forward tells us that the idea is “to tell the story of 9/11 in a way that the American people could read and understand.”  After all, what’s easier to understand than a disaster story and political thriller?  Us, the people, are so young and naïve, thank goodness they provided illustrations!  The word “story” is indicative of a certain degree of necessary fiction.  This is thus proven by colorful drawings of scenarios, the accuracy of which no person could have survived to prove (Airplane cockpits).  The illustrations, instead of making the book easier to read, distract, desensitize, and even caricature the horrible events of that day.  Herein the event is mythologized, thus making the real unreal, or cinematic.

According to the “narrative,” the Afghan War was a quick conflict with undisputed success (If you don’t believe me read it yourself).  This book was published in 2006, it is now 2011 and we are still in Afghanistan.   The ahistoricity exists in the fact that assumptions are made about events that haven’t played out fully.

In a review on the back of the book Marvel Comic’s Stan Lee gushes, “It will surely set the standard for all future works of contemporary history, graphic or otherwise, and should be required reading in every home, school, and library.”  Stan Lee was a major role player in the invention of the modern superhero.  Much like the aesthetic itself, the quote implies a dichotomy between good versus evil.  As stated earlier, the “evildoers” are overwhelmingly misrepresented.  Objective history (if there is such a thing) has no agenda.  To propagandize is to pick and choose facts.  The 9/11 Report A Graphic Adaptation depicts the United States first as a victim, then as a hero.  It is the plot of everyone’s favorite action film.  The best part about it is that it’s true…or so we are led to believe.

Because everything's better with a Batman analogy

Let us compare John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s address to the nation in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis, the closest the United States has ever come to nuclear war to that of George W Bush’s in the wake of 9/11.  Right away, without having to read them, the difference in length is profound.  Kennedy’s is three or four times as long as that of Bush’s.  Although intelligence may have been more abundant, the forwardness with which we were addressed is quite different.  Kennedy lays out the threat in full and the course of action, the very same which was implemented, was explained.  Bush incessantly used the word “evil” and even quoted the Bible.  The implication here seems to be an “it’s in God’s hands now,” mentality.  In his defense, the perpetrators were still unknown but undoubtedly Bush’s rhetoric implies that we the people will make them pay.  Kennedy’s signifies that he will keep the people safe and with no unnecessary violence.  We were treated like adults.  This is not a critique on George Bush but on the contemporary society in which we live.  Kennedy was in office at a much different time.  The world was a different place.

What can we take away from this?  Kennedy relayed facts as he knew them.  Bush stated the obvious and, through his rhetoric, intended to raise emotions.  Once again, in the wake of 9/11 little needed to be said.  Bush’s constant use of the word “evil” signified that we were “good.”  In history there is no good or evil.  It is always a case of clashing ideologies, each side has their own reasons and a good historian will find the middle ground and record it as truthfully as is possible.

History textbooks are written, rewritten and revised constantly.  The 9/11 Report hasn’t been and won’t be.  Why are we so quick to generalize?  Could it be the fact that we are the “instant gratification generation?  Our nationalism is so strong that our anger and pride blind our rationality.  We educate ourselves with Fox and MSNBC, both of which use political theatrics to harbor support.  Now must we even grow weary of historical documentation?  Let us use the past and learn from it instead of using it to propagandize for the present.  History should manufacture itself, not be manufactured.

Since the self-immolation of one man in Tunisia on Dec 17 2010, political instability and down-right upheaval has been achieved by the use of civilian demonstrations throughout North Africa and the Middle East. It started in Tunisia when a man — who recently had his property destroyed by authorities — comite suicide by lighting himself on fire in public. It was a signal; the revolution had begun. Muhamed Bouazizi’s tragic act of protest ignited a flame that now burns throughout the mideast; a flame of protest and of rage. I could list all of the countries where there have been protests calling for political reform but showing the map would be a lot more effective.

Al Jazeera

Shit got really real

Get the picture? One thing that we’ve learned while watching the protests is that somewhere around the time Israel invaded the Gaza strip for the second time, NATO deciding to liberate a third country, and between one brutal bone crushing dictator and a lawless land of pirate anarchy SHIT GOT REAL. The people in the middle east are demanding democratic reform because it is about god dam time they did.

Latest Updates in the Mid-East Saga:

• NATO has integrated Operation Odyssey Dawn into its command and control structure.
• Syrian, Yemen and Bahrain protests take a violent disturbing turn.
• UN decides in London that coalition Airstrikes in Libya will persist.
• Quick Glenn Beck Blast: Hit play on both of the videos at the same time and keep the volume equal.

Libya is literally on fire while rebels advance west towards the capital Tripoli. They are supported by a UN resolution to “protect civilians” from  COL Gaddafi’s mercenary armies. American Tomahawk missile barrages wiped out the Libyan air defense system, which then cleared the way for European Typhoon and Tornado airstrikes to paralyzed Gaddafi’s ground forces. The idea is that if coalition and NATO forces disable Gaddafi’s military capabilities, the civilians/rebels can overthrow the regime. Right now Libyan rebel forces are moving west along the main coastal road from Benghazi to Tripoli. They have made huge strategic gains by recapturing the oil-producing regions in the middle of the country. Rebels are currently besieging COL Gaddafi’s hometown of Sirte which is along the route from Benghazi to Tripoli. The name of the UN sanctioned no-fly zone is operation Odyssey Dawn, reflecting the hopes of the western world that this will be a real liberal revolution that brings stability and peace to a long troubled region.

The Domino Theory

Domino Theory became popular in US foreign policy after World War II. It hypothesized that if one country in a region falls under the influence of communism, then another nearby will also fall, then another until all of the surrounding countries are influenced in a domino effect. The domino effect is a term used in mechanics which refers to an occurrence when a small change causes a similar change nearby, which then will cause another similar change and so on in a linear sequence; also called a chain reaction.

Both the wars in Vietnam and Korean were highly influenced by the Domino Theory. Americans feared that if Vietnam was allowed to fall to communism along with China and Korea, then the surrounding countries would be very soon to follow and the contagion could even reach India, looming then and now as a global power.

Like dominos

If we fast forward in time to Bush II we see that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld liked to show a picture of the Korean peninsula and point out the Capitalist bottom half was all lit up with lights, and the poor communist North dark as hell. He believed that helping the spread of democracy anywhere — even by the use of force– was beneficial because if people had a choice, the would choose capitalism, and everyone in the free world would benefit from the newly opened markets.

Look at all those lightbulbs South Korea chose to buy instead of rockets that don't even work. That's because AMERICA invented the lightbulb so AMERICA could work at night -- or plan world domination. O and China is all dark too but sh they are scary ninjas and that just part of their ninja code of never being seen or heard.

Now if we go backwards in time to 1976 and Donald Rumsfeld is again the secretary of defense but for President Ford. He was also the US Ambassador to NATO in 1973 for Richard Nixon who once said of him, “He’s a ruthless little bastard.”

The term “Arab Spring” started popping up after the 2003 invasion of Iraq to describe a  tone of optimism by the Bush administration that after the liberation of Iraq a wave of pro-western democracy would sweep the region in a domino effect. The mid east democratic domino effect was dismissed as a Dubya moment and the term lost its popularity after democratic elections in Lebanon and Palestine elected Hamas and Hezbollah — two recognized terrorist organizations who widely oppose the west and American intervention in the region. Which brings up the elephant in the room — democracy can bring anti-western or Islamist candidates to power as much as it can phantom Arab microeconomists.

Al Jazeera, who supports the protests one-hundred percent, has described the unrest sweeping the middle east as an Arab Spring at least once. Al Jazeera is a liberal force in the Arab world as a free news agency, a keystone of democracy. They are fearless and selfless. “Um Nobel prize please?” says Al Jazeera for their support of the wave of democracy.

The Obama Administration and its fans are going to take some credit, But most of it should go to the people who are doing the protesting and supporting the logistics. The real question is can we really give Bush I and II credit for doing something right, or at least something happening that they planned would happen? Does the Iraq war suddenly become not so bad of an idea if there is a transition to democracy?

US Dept of SpyOps secret Weapon (code name: The Hoff)

Ok so we know that Al Jazeera’s reporting, the likability of President Obama, the actual people demanding their rights, and hundreds of Tomahawk missiles all contribute to the fermenting of democracy but now that authoritarian regimes are falling mainly due to our collective mind powers this has now become a legitimate Psyops campaign. Psyops like the kind we used on Eastern Europe to destroy the Soviet Union. There we used our MTV music videos, Hollywood and David Hasselhoff.

Except that was the 80s, now it’s the future and we have the internet. Protests are organized by twitter and Facebook, regimes are targeted by thousands of activists across the globe as they form rouge computer hacker clans such as the notable Anonymous which played a crucial role in sparking the Tunisian uprising. Yep this may have all in fact started when hackers from Anonymous conducted Operation Tunisia as part of Operation Payback to protest the arrest of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange on swedish rape accusations. They targeted the websites of Swedish prosecutors, Mastercard, Amazon, and the Tunisian establishment as it was repressing the demonstrations.

Shortly before the Libyan military intervention began a new Twitter superstar was spewing militant language across the web and people where loving it. Charlie Sheen broke a Guinness world record by acquiring over one-million Twitter followers in 25 hours and 17 minutes. Sheen has pumped up the militant language and maybe, without even really knowing it prepared the nation for war. His followers are up to 3 million now and they are all apart of his “army of vatican assassins” who pledge allegiance to the Warlock Warrior that is Charlie Sheen.

There’s a fine line between making harmless jokes that lighten the situation, and being borderline racist. The now famous “ching chong ding dong girl” clearly crossed that line in her Youtube rant complaining about Asians talking loudly on the phone in the library — which in fact is a widely recognized occurrence. Everyone just wasn’t stupid enough to make a Youtube rant about it on accounts that 80% of Asians are ninja certified. Choosing now as the time to post that rant, as well as make references to the recent natural disaster, was especially not the right thing to do.

Twitter is a precious vessel into our true self. It all turns out to be ironic I think — how we use our real names on Facebook and imply that the “profile” page we create is a reflection of our actual selves. We’re very careful about what we post on Facebook because know anyone can Google search a person’s name and maybe come up with their page. On the other hand there’s Twitter where we don’t use our real names and can choose to not reveal our real self completely. Under the cover of anonymity we feel free to express our truly egotistical and sadistic thoughts.

“50 Cent,” or should we say Curtis Jackson, is well-known in amongst the Twitter community for his sharp wit, thick swag, and joyous humor. Upon hearing the news of an impending tsunami heading in California’s direction he felt compelled to act:

You can see there that he was overtaken by political correctness. Sadly, a spreading contagion. A lame #Pray trend was being spread around by celebrities in order to support their image as human beings and not emotionless cyborgs (or just computer made images). A celebrity of my hometown who is an avid Twitterer (which also reveals him as a black libertarian) is NFL Hall of Famer Thurman Thomas. From having a slight connection to the religious right he was one of the first to jump on the “Pray for Japan Bandwagon:”

50 Cent was criticized for his tweets and so were many other people who tried to lighten the situation with a Godzilla joke or what-not. One person who was surprisingly sober throughout the entire episode was twitter superstar Charlie Sheen(Carlos Esteves):

#Winning

There’s no way you could have missed it — the horrible sequence of events that cant only be described as the 2011 Japanese earthquake then tsunami. Horrible images showed a powerful sea of debris, mud, water and flame devour entire towns. Thousands of people are still missing. Thousands are dead. I would say that it is a natural disaster of biblical proportions but that would be a downgrade.

[Even though it is horrible to say] This is the part of the movie when Godzilla walks out of a crater in the earth caused by the earthquake and starts to terrorize humanity.

Clearly this screenshot is from the 1998 American reboot where he decideds to swimm a few thousand miles, ninja-like sneak across a continent, and lay its eggs in New York Cities' Madison Square Garden. Why? because the old subway tunnels are perfect for hiding in.

Except we’ve all forgotten, it’s a new decade, it’s the future. Everything is tronned out, not tricked up. The new horror of the 21.1st century is a nuclear meltdown threat like none other since the Three-mile Island incident.

Due to a power failure and structural damage from both the tsunami and 8.9 magnitude earthquake the cooling system at the Fukushima power plant went down and began the threatdown. Right now the plant is giving off radiation 1/10th as strong as the event at Three-mile Island that killed zero people, but it could get worse — or that is what all the hullaballoo on the TV is about. Seems like there are three questions to ponder:

1. What is the threat of a full nuclear meltdown?

2. WTF is a nuclear meltdown and how bad is it?

3. Are the rest of the nuclear reactors around the globe vulnerable to natural disasters?

I’m no scientist, but a nuclear meltdown is when the fuel of a nuclear reactor — Uranium — over heats and literally melts through its containment material. It keeps getting hotter and actually starts to melt a hole in the earth. The heat of the reaction causes everything else to catch on fire and off flies away the radioactive ash.

After the devastation that resulted from the Chernobyl meltdown in Europe everyone became sufficiently and rightly terrified of anything like that happening ever again, and many a scientist get down to the root of the problem of what caused the disaster in order to make sure that it never happened again. I don’t want to offend any Russians but they found out the plant at Chernobyl was pretty retardedly built. The reactors inner core was made out of graphite, which is a great radiation shield but it also tends to catch on fire — exactly what happened.

If the Fukushima plant does somehow completely catch on fire, begin a full meltdown, and start ejecting radioactive fallout into the atmosphere it could be very bad for the entire pacific region -- which includes Hawaii and the West coast of the United States.

Now-a-days nuclear plants are made completely different. They use Iron or something instead of graphite and use the heat from the nuclear fuel to make steam, which then turns a turbine in a generator. The materials they use now to contain the nuclear fuel are much stronger and the threat of the whole place catching on fire and spewing radioactive ash into the atmosphere is very low.

However there have been reports of a few explosions going off in some of the reactors. This is caused by all of the coolant around the fuel being turned into steam. Normally the cooling system would filter out the steam and in more water to maintain a safe temperature but the cooling system is broken. Now the hot fuel is exposed to the steam which allows the hydrogen to separate from oxygen and accumulate into hydrogen gas, which is a very flammable substance. This is why they have resorted to dumping seawater into the reactors to try and cool them down.

Especially after recent disasters like the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and the earthquake in Haiti, interest in public disaster preparedness level has peaked. The Japanese have a lot of experience when it comes to earthquakes and they were not surprised by the magnitude of this recent quake. It was the powerful tsunami that shocked the world.

Que Japan TV for explosion

The fact is that there are many nuclear plants around the world near fault lines, especially ones that may be in California. It looks like the meltdown at the Fukushima plant is going to be worse than the Three-mile Island incident. It will also most likely raise concern and spark a conversation about the environmental impact of expanding our use of nuclear energy.

As far as the numbers work out right now, I don’t think we have to worry about nuclear meltdowns happening every other decade and ruining the environment. First because nothing like what happened in Japan is likely to happen anywhere else where there are nuclear reactors. They have a ton of reactors in Europe, but very little earthquakes. They have some earthquakes on the West coast of the United States and California has two reactors, but they are built to withstand the necessary stress. Second, becase there is only 104 reactors(65 plants) in the Unites States. When we think about it in relation to oil wells — which there are hundreds of thousands of on and off-shore — it really seems insignificant. When comparing nuclear energy to energy from fossil fuels like oil and coal nuclear power is “clean” and considered by many a sustainable solutin to our energy problems. This is why the US is considered to be behind Europe in developing nuclear technology. France currently gets 78% of its electricity from nuclear power plants using 67 reactors. Despite France’s success and relative saftey of nuclear power Forbes is reporting that the disaster in Japan is raising concerns in Europe and across the globe. The US has not built a new reactor in several years but China has halted its construction and development of their nuclear energy program to revise their saftey percausions after the Fukushima incident.

There is no questin that in an world with increasing environmental awarness there is going to be a lot of discussion about whether or not expanding our use of nuclear power is going to be an asset or a liability in the future.

The whites had made themselves ‘despotic masters of the mulattoes and tyrannical masters of the blacks,’ and if the latter wished to ‘overthrow the cruel and shameful yoke under which they suffer, they are authorized to use any means available.’ Even ‘massacring their oppressors to the last’ (Dubois 129).

The contagion of liberty would indeed spread, at the speed of burning cane. The colonists tried desperately to maintain their dominance over the slaves. An effort that was eternally futile.

The struggle for freedom was long and hard-fought. The success of the slave insurrection would produce something new to the western world. An epic tale that depicted African slaves as heroes, something that rocked the world of the European elite. Toussaint Louverturen, a Creole freeborn African, elevated himself to a General of Napoleon and became known as the “black Spartacus.” Almost ironically he was the pioneer of what we can also call oppression – quasi-slavery. “He maintained and perfected a coercive system that sought to keep [freed slaves] working on plantations” (Dubois 4). Louverture’s system of a plantation economy powered by the labor of freed slaves became a model for all post-emancipation societies thereafter. He created a power-vacuum that enabled his successor to declare himself emperor, and deprive the citizens of Haiti true liberty, which is a democratic republic that recognizes the natural rights of all men, and women. We have to view the Haitian revolution in the light of this significant defect and because of this it is not ideal, but none of the Atlantic revolutions were.

Just as Haiti served as a model for oppression and a target of prejudice, Haiti may now serve as an experimenting ground for reparations and restitution (Klein). In the wake of a devastating earthquake in modern day Haiti, the international community has finally shown the small third world country the compassion that it deserves. US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is seeing about relieving Haiti of its foreign debt (America 202.7), a move that would be almost as revolutionary as was the revolution to begin with. However, the citizens of Haiti shouldn’t get their hopes up for this noble act to be performed. Some things never change, and as one of Napoleon’s commanders would note on the eve of the 19^th century, Americans are still “the most Jewish of Jews”(Dubois), and not a single dollar of the 1.15 billion promised by the US government to help Haiti rebuild after the earthquake has been able to trickle through the Senate (Associated Press). Meanwhile, as the people of Haiti await foreign aid, the government has to thwart attempts of installing quasi-colonialism from foreign investors and influences. American Rap icon Wyclef Jean has recently pulled out of Haiti’s presidential race only after a court ruled that he was not eligible to run (Aceshowbiz). The saga continues.

Works Cited

In his essay, John Taylor Gatto presents some arguments suggesting the modern US education system was modeled after that of the military state of Prussia, the quintessential socially organized state.(509) The kingdom of Prussia reached the apex of its world influence in the 19^th century when it dominated northern Germany both politically and economically. Prussia eventually became the core component of the North German Confederation in 1867, which became part of the German Empire in 1871. Prussia eventually was abolished as a state de facto by the Nazis in 1934 and de jure by the Allied Powers following the end of Word War II. Gatto Hypothesizes that it was during the Progressive Era, before World War I, when our leaders decided to replicate the Prussian system of education here in the US.(509) One can understand where the issue lies in borrowing any system from a state that later committed such abominable acts. Since then Germany has become the prime example of what not to do as a nation. Both a positive and a negative set of virtues are equated with Prussian culture. Some of the positive Prussian virtues include: perfect organization, discipline, rule of law, obedience to authority, reliability, tolerance, thriftiness, punctuality, modesty, and diligence. But also, some negative attributes include: lack of freedom, personal repression, bureaucratic reglementation, blind obedience, cultural arrogance and amoral rationalism. US planners may have overlooked some of the negative effects of Prussian culture when they where admiring its education system and trying to implement a similar structure in the United States. They may have also liked the way that the Prussian type of system created predictable sheople – people who do not think for themselves and only do what they have been told or observed.

John Taylor Gatto blames the “Prussianization” — as he calls it — of our school system for its entire downfall. He says that because of this occurrence the united states is left with, “an education system deliberately designed to produce mediocre intellects, to hamstring the inner life, to deny students appreciable leadership skills, and to ensure docile and incomplete citizens in order to render the populace “manageable.”(509) What Gatto is saying is that as American citizens we are deceived of the purpose of our education system. It’s not there to improve an individual’s quality of life, but only to make each person a useful subject of the state. Whether the function of the education system is really this sinister or not, Gatto provides a useful analysis. He identifies six techniques that he says the education system uses to meet this goal. Three of them are relevant and a cause for concern. According to each persons social standing, the techniques being used often lead to disturbances in a person’s life.

One of the functions of the American school system that Gatto describes is “the conformity function.”(510) This function tries to make everyone who attends school as alike as possible. In Gatto’s radical interpretation, the aim of this function is to create a public that is predictable and malleable. This causes a tremendous problem in the United States because of the fact that there is so much diversity here. People of all cultures and all nationalities come here to work and live. It is completely irrational to believe that school could teach everyone to think and act the same, but this is precisely what our education system is designed to do. As mentioned earlier, bell hooks explains what it was like to go through school being different than most other students. She was a poor black girl in a college filled with middle to upper class white girls. When commenting on the different attitudes of her and her peers she said she felt like an outsider.(516) That’s because socially she was, in fact, an outsider. College is expensive; and poor people are generally excluded from it unless they are considerably gifted and receive a scholarship — which was the case for bell hooks. She also felt like an outsider because of her race. School reinforces the negative social tendency to outcast the “other,” or unique. Students are rewarded for homogeneous, correct performance. Those that do not give the accepted responses are punished. This system conditions society to put unique individuals in averse situations, and reinforces in-group/out-group social rivalries. The pressure that school puts on people to all be the same, and the treatment received from the other students caused a great amount of stress for hooks. It affected her life and perspective on society as a whole, causing her to switch schools, and eventually make it her life’s work to improve conditions.

Another function of the education system is what Gatto identifies as “the differentiation function.”(510) This phase happens later on in a person’s schooling in which Gatto states, “children are to be sorted by role and trained only so far as their destination in the social machine merits.”(510) This means that each person is evaluated and graded according to their performance. These grades are then used to determine which programs a student ought to be placed in. This is supposed to be an objective process. Judging one another solely on merit, and not metaphysical interpretations, is the only possible way to have a fair and just society. It eradicates privilege, by giving opportunity to real talents. However, even when students are solely judged on performance the system may not work out best for them. They could excel in a non-standard subject, or learn better under different conditions that are not normal classroom procedure. In some cases, class or race can also affect how someone is graded. In a classic example of stereotyping, University at Buffalo student Diandrea Lewis was denied placement in an advanced learning class because a counselor pre-judged her capabilities. As a black student, Diandrea was switching high-schools and enrolling for classes when a counselor questioned whether or not she was smart enough be in an advanced placement class. This happened even though Diandrea was on track to be in AP classes at her former school. She was denied enrollment in the class and later saw that there was a social/racial divide at the school between the advanced and regular classes. One of her teachers later mentioned that she should have been in the AP class. This reflected a complex social issue where people sometimes conflate being black with unintelligence, showing how factors such as these can affect someone’s education.

The previous example can also relate to another of Gatto’s school functions. This one called the “diagnostic and directive function.” (510) As Gatto states, “school is meant to determine each student’s proper social role.” If this where indeed a fact, its obvious to see how the quality of a person‘s education, which can be influenced by metaphysical factors, can have an omnipotent influence in their life. Circumspectly, almost all races have some sort of prejudice attached to them. For example: Asians have above average intelligence, white males are trouble makers, or blond females are unintelligent. Everyone’s life can be manipulated by the numerous social factors that may influence one’s education. The idea of class can also play a role in the diagnostic and directive function. People of the upper classes are often predestined to obtain societies more distinguished positions. This can be reflected in the way that people’s parents or associates can get them accepted into the nations finest institutions. In these instances a person’s social status improves the quality of their education. People of lower classes do not share the same prerogative as the upper class. They may be sent straight to a trade school after high-school, where they learn to perform difficult manual tasks. Their class decides their place in society, and thus the level of schooling necessary.

After a moments consideration one can conclude that many of the discrepancies people have with our nation’s school system relate to factors in our society that are out of the hands of administrators. We might not necessarily be at fault with using the same type of education system that is embraced by the majority of the world. The evil associated with Gatto’s “Prussian connection” implications refer only to how negative social factors can defame any institution. John Taylor Gatto is spirited in his critique of the origins of our education system, but if we delve more deeply into his accusations we find that he appears to me creating a myth or conspiracy theory. It is precisely these types of stimulants that cause people to make irrational metaphysical interpretations of society. For our nation to prosper in the future we need to relieve class tensions. Getting rid of the idea of class altogether would be the ultimate positivist goal, but this is impractical. A good way to start would be to eliminate privilege by judging students objectively, according to merit. This gives everyone an equal opportunity to use education as a means of emancipation, through enlightenment. This principle of our education system is why a lot of people think it works well in improving society.

Works Cited

Gatto, John Taylor. “Against School.” Acting Out Culture. Ed. John Miller. New York: Bedford/St. Martins, 2008. 506-514

Hooks Bell. “Learning in the shadow of Race and Class.” Acting Out Culture. Ed. John Miller. New York: Bedford/St. Martins, 2008. 515-23