Saphire,author of the incredible Novel, 'Push' now a stunning movie called 'Precious' gives an interview to Katie Couric

Watch. It.


Watch CBS News Videos Online

I'm waiting to see it over here, in London. I do have some criticisms about the 'colourism' in the film (the black people who are kind and decent are very light skinned, a choice made by the black director when casting. Who has admitted HE has a colour complex,and used to favour fair skinned blacks over dark ones:( ) which is a major problem in our community, and which in the book is something that afflicts Precious-who yearns to be light...the director's casting choices actually undermine the author's intentions.The writer has a dark skinned character who is crucial to helping Precious and is a role model for her. But still, despite that, kudos to Lee Daniel, Tyler Perry, and Oprah Winfrey for bringing this film to the screen. And in Gabourey Sidibe, playing Precious, a new star is born.

I want as many people as possible to know, and understand that 'The Poor' have as many creative, innovative people in their ranks, as anyone else. That if someone is a genius, and born into poverty (or war or catastrophe) that genius doesn't just disappear. The tragedy of it is that mostly, such people won't get to express it, and that is a major loss to the world.

William Kamkwamba is a youngster from rural Malawi, born into a family of small farmers in a village of 60 families. His family had to stop sending him to secondary school (i.e the schooling you get ages 11-18) because they couldnt afford to pay $80 per year. So his formal education ended at- 12?13?14? William, however, is a genius. He was determined to receive an education somehow. He would go to the public library, and take out books, paricularly science books. Though they were printed in English, which he couldn't read much.So he would try to learn the words via the diagrams.
So when the village started suffering starvation because of crop failure through drought, he decided to do something about it. He saw a book which said windmills could be used to pump water, and generate electricity.He managed to get hold of some books in a library in English (which, remember, is not his first language and which at the time he could barely read).Using persistence, the diagrams and above all HIS BRAIN he worked out how to put together a windmill using scraps from junkyards. He used a tractor fan, pvc pipes, shock absorbers,bycycle frame, pvc blades, bycycle generator. As these items were scrap, we can imagine the condition they were in. He had no help- in fact peope in the village thought he was crazy.Including his Mum!
William just knew he wanted to build a windmill to have water and electricity.Through persistence, trial and error, depite the family being down to one meal a day, he struggled and completed his first windmill in 2 months. HE WAS 14 YEARS OLD. He has subsequently built other windmills. He worked out how to do an electrical circuit- complete with breakers- to get electricity in the family home. As time has gone on and he has learnt and refined the process, there is a deep water well, solar panels bright lighting in his family compuond. Members of his village have been shown how to build windmills.There is a project to create windmills, electricity, irrigation ad acces to education for other families. his story was spread, first by journalists, then the blogosphere, and he has ended up being a speaker at TED and is attending a school in Africa grooming him and other to be ethical leaders.



I'm a great believer in human ingenuity and the human spirit.
William,and people like him are the ones we talk about in the West when we talk about 'sub-Saharan Africa and its problems'. This great continent is covered in the news as consisting of aids-war-famine-disease-corruption-wildlife. Its people are presented as victims of all of this, with a few exceptions. Hmm. Well, there are approximately 53 countries in Africa, its a continent so huge you could plonk the landmass of the US or India in it and still have room, and it has at least 2,500 ethnic groups. And I'm pretty confident, that it has thousands of youngsters like William.

See his talk at the TED conference this year here:
http://www.ted.com/talks/william_kamkwamba_how_i_harnessed_the_wind.html

I just saw this AMAZING video on minxy's LJ. It is a clear, concise arguement as to why the apologists for Polanski have got it all wrong:



It seems to me, people can't reconcile the fact of someone being a great artist AND a scumbag. Why not? The two aren't mutually exclusive.
Just as you can have the reverse: A person who is wonderful,... and talentless.
Artists don't have to be fabulous people. And creativity doesnt mean someone should get a free pass when it comes to acountability.

As for forgiveness. Well, criminal law is not dependent on whether the victim forgives the perpetrator. It can't be. You would then have a situation where you never/rarely prosecuted parents who abused children - (children often love their parents, no mater what)or victims of domestic violence (who often stay with/keep going back to the abuser).I could go on, but you get my drift..

And as for Whoopi 'it wasnt rape-rape' Goldberg on The View. Trying to deal with it legalistically...well all I can say is (wearing my lawyer hat) Shut.The *@! Up!.

A very interesting, insightful analysis has appeared, done by Brendan O'Meill at 'Spiked'.
here: http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/7464/

My take on it - commenting both on O'Neill's article and on the situation is as follows:-

This... is brilliant, measured, insightful.
As a lawyer- I agree that it would have been helpful to have a debate about arrest warrants for long ago crimes (e.g Nazi war criminals).

I happen to think that with certain crimes, there should be no time barring as regards prosecution.

As a 'liberal' I don't see how this type of case is a positive example of 'pushing back the boundaries of..' anything.

As a mother- I do think Britain is in the grip of hysteria about paedophilia, but I dont think raping and sodomizing children-however eminent the perpetrator- is something that should be a matter of artistic licence due to a)the passage of time and b) the forgiveness of the victim.

The factors the pro-Polanski side want taken into consideration are perhaps relevant when it comes to sentencing. Not whether the man should be held culpable. Ultimately, the furore about this boils down to that current obsession, celebrity. If Polanski had been a Mexican-American, senior citizen who worked as a labourer, found in Central or South America after 3 decades as a fugitive, no one would be defending him.

Rap. The music of The Ghetto...
Here are 2 classics, each keeping it real.
East Coast:




West Coast:

Yep, its International Talk Like A Pirate Day. Aaaarrrrr!

For those of ye, who know not how, here is a little lesson in verbal piratitude:



Now when ye've mastered the speech, tis time for a little pirate singing:



And then, its time for a little pirate humour:
Q. Why do young pirates always fail when saying the alphabet in kindergarten?
A.Because their fathers insist that there are seven Cs!!!!

Q.What do pirates wear in the winter?
A. Long Johns!

Q.What did pirates do,when they noticed that their skin was rough?
A. They blamed the corsair.Harrrrr

And finally, landlubbers, THE pirate joke.
QUESTION: WHY ARE PIRATES CALLED PIRATES?
RESPONSE: I DON'T KNOW,WHY ARE PIRATES CALLED PIRATES?
ANSWER: BECAUSE THEY AAARRRRRE!!!!!

Someone has very thoughtfully given us a birds' eye view of Mr West's various interruptions at key moments. Appropriately titled: 'I'm a let you finish'

Ever wanted to know what it would be like if you crossed good rap lyrics and auto-tune with one newly elected President??

Hmm :)


Its worth checking out Iman Crosson's hilarious impersonations of Obama on YouTube, and the woman playing Michelle,Vernetta Jenkins too.
Hilarious to see 'Bush' 'Cheney' and 'Sarah Palin' grooving in the vid!

I tried to get in to see 'Colin' the Brit zombie movie made over 18 months for £45($70) but when I turned up at the Frightfest filmfest at 11 AM BANK HOLIDAY MONDAY MORNING *gasp* it was sold out. :(

Anyhoo, as someone who wrote about films for a magazine for years, I still keep an eye out for examples of good, low budget indie efforts.I'm interested in how young people- with little/no money and often without going near film school- explore their creativity.
Machinima (using gaming footage to create new films with voice actors, music, sound editing etc) is one way. Fan vidding is an obvious other...My son found and showed me an amazing lo budget approach to horror today. Is it the future??

THIS...YOU GOTTA SEE.

I'm a Brit, yes I live in the country with the evil, socialised health system that wouldnt have valued Stephen Hawking :)

I do think it likely that on each side of the Atlantic, there are misconceptions about how the other side's healthcare system works.
All I can say is:

* On my last visit to the US to see relatives in nice, suburban northern California, I got into random discussions with people and they volunteered information about difficulties cause by health crises post redundancy, or a couple years before Medicare eligibility, or decisions by insurers that a claim was ruled out because of a pre-existing condition.

* I had great difficulty grasping what they were telling me as I had never had to think about finance in relation to my health needs or my family's.

* The US reforms couldnt ever be the same as the British system, as the doctors trained here, however eminent, all trained in publicly owned medical schools and as a result, have a committment to the NHS even if they also have a private practice.All those over say 35 would not have incurred student debt as until 10 years ago students didnt pay towards their university education.They got grants to cover everything.

This documentary by 60 minutes was aired in March 2008, before the curren debate. Its on YouTube, so I'm assuming the subsequent parts of it are findable in the usual way.

Its about Remote Area Medical, founded by a Brit to do medical work in developing countries in remote areas without access to medical services. His organisation is now finding it has 60% of its work now in the US...which has the world's biggest economy.

I'm a fan of Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse Books. I am aware of Alan Ball's accomplishments.I love HBO because of 'The Wire'. Put them together in a blender and you get the delirious southern gothic-trashy-brilliant dialogue-crammed-with-acting-talent-and- amazing-SUPPORTING-character-actors that is the show TRUEBLOOD.

A show that uses vampires- living openly amongst humans thanks to the invention of synthetic blood- as a metaphor for racism/homophobia.Nonsensical, as oppressed groups don't usually have superhuman abilities and immortality...despite that hiccup,standout performances like Nelsan Ellis as Lafayette (taking on Omar from The Wire's mantle as the most baddass gay man on tv)and Ryan Kwanten as Jason Stackhouse(ticking all the stereotype boxes film and tv likes- good 'ol southern boy, dumb jock,posterboy for promiscuity, and then makes you see his vulnerability,striving to be more}...these and other actors make this MUST WATCH tv.
The marketing campaign is bloody brilliant. Faux documentaries, adverts for the Amercian Vampire League, covincing fake news bulletins- all viewable at YouTube...viral marketing at its most awesome.

Watch episodes, then head over to the hilarious recaps/reviews at TV Without Pity.
And, Oh Yes, the heart of the show is relationship between Sookie, a barmaid living in a small community in rural Louisiana, and Bill a 170+ year old vampire. Both played by award winning actors. Um,the gif below gives you an idea of the depths of their...relationship.





Or, you could look at ThinkHero 'Taste My Juice' spoof promo.Just make sure you're not eating or drinking anything at the time ! Actually, go to ThinkHero's site to hang out generally. Their 'Michael Bay directs Harry Potter' has to be seen to be believed.

My Friends page gets TED, but I don't know how many people read my Friends page :)
I know I read a number of other peoples' LJ Friends pages religiously- xanthe, cesperanaza, minxy- are the key ones. Thanks to them, I've found and seen a TON of fabulous stuff. The video below, I found on Cesperanza's Friends page- she has fabulous stuff on there, plus is one of the best writers in fandom EVER.(Read "Written by the Victors" if you don't believe me..)

Anyhoo,
This appeared on her page, via TED. An organisation that I plan to one day do something vital enough to get to speak at one of their happenings. They have events with people from around the Globe presenting ideas in all fields. This video -on the TED site and my Friends page- is of an engineer called Michael Pritchard. He got fired up by The Tsunami of 2004 and Katrina a few months later to come up with a way that disaster victims could get clean water, cheaply, without needing infrastructure, coming into tent cities-where disease could spread- or the need to ship over millions of bottled water. A filtration system that could filter out bacteria and viruses, so people could use muddy river etc water.

Fantastic for International Disasters.

But I think its most powerful impact could be in poor countries where private, western water companies have moved in, and are making a killing.Formerly public systems of water delivery have- at IMF/World Bank pressure- been privatised, with disastrous results. Clean,drinkable water could save the lives of MILLIONS of children each year.

So, lets do our bit. Spread the idea, first. Action next.

Here it is. Watch it. Spread it. You can grab a version to embed on your Blog from YouTube.



Thanks, Cesperanza!

I saw the BGT ep via YouTube and, like everyone else, was gobsmacked, very moved. A combination of her lovely, down to earth personality, the fact that she comes across as someone whose had some knocks in life but is still surviving, and the voice.
And then, I started thinking about it.

There's some kind of charisma going on-quite apart from the hysteria that viral marketing can induce- and part of it is people's weariness around the globe with the status quo, and how it's got us into an unholy mess-economically, politically, environmentally. At the moment, ANYTHING that challenges the status quo, the received wisdom, is...liberating.

As 'entertainment' has gone global, crossing cultural and geographic boundaries, its come at a cost. 'Stars' are promoted to look, sound and act the same, and be airbrushed out of all but the most feeble quirks.Those who dont fit within increasingly narrow frameworks, are rejected at earlier and earlier stages.
As the people who consume entertainment, we are both complicit in all this and oppressed by it. The lovely, escapist dreams we all indulge in from time to time -I could be the next big singer/dancer/athlete/artist - become not even worth having, as these people even in the earliest stages of their lives become less and less like us.

So now, when someone 'normal' slips through, there's HUGE enthusiasm.

You remember last November? For a magical 24 hours, around the globe people were willing Barack Obama to win, then absolutely euphoric when he did. It wasn't just that he was the un-Bush. He was from outside the caste of people in his society who normally reached that position. He was bright and educated, yes, but we all felt we knew someone like him.Nice, a bit earnest, a bit of a nerd, decent, ambitious, but not in a 'throw your granny under the bus' way. He's had some packaging, sure, but he's not removed from real folks. In my case, his wife was an even greater indication that something was up. She is exactly the kind of black professional woman I've been acquainted with over the last 30+ years.We are from similar backgrounds,both becoming lawyers when the odds were stacked against us, and trying to keep our feet on the ground.These are not the sort of people who usually get through.

Going back to the entertainment industry,the tv talent shows, supposed to open things up to new talent, paradoxically show how things have closed down so much. Whether singers or actors,models or artists, the look, the image, the 'package' comes before everything. One of the very few avenues of escape open to poor people with talent is being closed off as corporate concerns seek to ensure returns on their investments. So many who come through now, have been to stage schools, have relatives already in the business, have a 'look'.

The Susan Boyle thing is giving a middle finger to all that. It'll be hilarious to watch as the powers that be scramble to harvest what money they can out of it, whilst dealing with someone so...different.
In the meantime


'Cry Me A River' is a jazz standard, and the arrangement here is quite old fashioned...and I think her voice on it is even more phenomenal than on BGT.
I wouldnt have said Susan Boyle had a voice for jazz, but the pure quality of it and the emotion, makes her version of the song stunning.

Hope she gets a chance to really live, travel, work as a singer and be appreciated, without being chewed up and spat out by showbiz.

And I hope she doesnt get made over!
She's great as she is-bushy eyebrows and all.

Things are bad, and getting worse. We aint seen nothing yet. Want to know how it happened? To get to grips with the vocabulary of the financial meltdown? Then, take a look at this:
This is 'The Crisis of Credit Visualized' by Jonathan Jarvis


The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

He describes his reason for doing this thus:'The goal of giving form to a complex situation like the credit crisis is to quickly supply the essence of the situation to those unfamiliar and uninitiated.' Its part of 'my broader thesis work exploring the use of new media to make sense of a increasingly complex world'.
I think he did a good job.
Visit his site on http://jdjarvis.com/ and give him a pat on the back!:D

Its a new era. Not due to one man, but more due to the fact that history goes in cycles. The current cycle has run for about 20-30 years, starting just prior to Reagan and Thatcher becoming leaders of their respective countries.
Free market supremacy, trickle-down theories, everything viewed through the prism of 'is it profitable?' and 'the private sector is always more efficient'
these have been the dominant ideas, played out gradually across the globe.

We are at the cusp of a new cycle.

When new cycles start, when the zeitgeist changes, it often seems to be embodied in one person- hence the (worryingly) messianic treatment of Barack Obama. Its down to all of us, though.

Here's an account of how some well known Black people felt in the run up to the US Presdiential election, and on election day itself. They're all American, because even though it felt like a world election, it wasn't.

...    Merry Christmas everyone!!  :-D

Uh....

This senior citizen has a blog:
< My name is Helen Philpot. I am 82 years old. My grandson taught me how to do this so that I could “blog” with my best friend Margaret Schmechtman who I met in college almost 60 years ago. I have three children with my husband Harold. Margaret has three dogs with her husband Howard. I live in Texas and Margaret lives in Maine.<

And she has her own, very strong views on the political scene, regarding
Bush 'a jackass', McCain 'an ass' and Sarah Palin.. well read what she thinks about her and why, here:


http://margaretandhelen.wordpress.com/2008/10/28/what-was-i-thinking-when-i-called-sarah-palin-a-bitch/

And even more moving, is this article, about Amanda Jones, 109, the daughter of a man born into slavery, living long enough to vote for a black man to be President of the United States...

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/10/27/1027jones.html

Erm, I have Canadian friends, family.
I just couldnt resist this - eh!





HaHaHaHaHa!!!
I'm going to run about the house shouting 'aboot'! (thats how my Canadian friend pronounces 'about')

I've had ambiguous feelings about trade unions in the UK and the US because I recall family and family friends on both sides of the Atlantic talking about how in the 1950s and 1960s the Unions would operate against the interests of the working classes as a whole by colluding in practises that discriminated against black workers.Helping the bosses divide black and white workers. A lot of that changed from the 1970s onwards- and even in the 50s +60s there were honorable exceptions.

In the UK we had things change so much that the head of our biggest Union, the Transport and General Workers Union from 1992-2003 was Jamaican born Bill Morris

In any general election, the issue for me is which government would best support working class people- or at worst, do the least harm? Whilst I may be a middle class person by profession now, I'll ALWAYS be the person who grew up in poor, working class area, and experienced slum housing in all its glory.

Thats why my contempt for Tony Blair and his neo-Conservative New Labour Project, holds no bounds.

I came across this major speech by AFL-CIO's Secretary Treasurer
Richard Trumka,which underlines why workers should vote Obama in 2008.Its an Excerpt of speech given at the Steelworkers convention July 1, 2008, sponsored by USW President Leo Gerard.

I was stunned at his openess, honesty, and passion.