hi i'm arbor! i can tap the reblog button and also say things that i think. i'm 23. i'm white (chahta descendant). i am tme. i'm genderfluid. lesbian again. autistic. please use they/he for pronouns. ok love you.
one really annoying thing about this american world cup, apart from the extra ad breaks, is they keep showing us fucking celebrities during the game. who gives a shit that beyonce is in the audience. also the dumbass half-time show theyre planning for the final. US culture is such celebrity obsessed ad-riddled garbage.
commentators here are just constantly mocking the fact that there will be a fucking half-time show at the finals, the "hydration" ad-breaks, and also that tickets to the finals cost around €4500,-
if the world cup was supposed to be like a sportswashing excercise for the USA, it has backfired pretty well. First the racist treatment of officials, players and fans by immigration, then the ridiculous open vindictive cheating by the USA by refusing visas for the Iranian team, and then the open corruption of Trump calling up the Fifa to make them cancel that red card for the US team.
A truly pathetic revelation of its national character by the USA. Mexico and Canada have been enjoyed and appreciated by all involved, in contrast.
lol, the Dutch national broadcaster isn't pulling any punches, calling out the corruption, racism, sportswashing and cheating by Trump, including bringing up the Epstein files, discrimination against the LGBTQ+ community, and the ICE murders of immigrants. As I said, the USA really used this World Cup to show itself to the world.
Translated article under the cut:
A day before the World Cup final, New York is covered in a thick layer of smog from Canadian wildfires, turning large parts of the northeastern United States gray. A symbolic conclusion to a World Cup that became a celebration of magnificent football in packed stadiums, but was also marked by extreme weather, human rights violations, and political interference.
FIFA critic Jules Boykoff doesn't have to think long about the question of what stood out most for him outside of the sport: "The reversal of that red card, following political pressure from President Donald Trump. I think that will go down in history as one of the biggest controversies in World Cup history."
With a single phone call to FIFA boss Infantino, the president managed to overturn the automatic suspension of American star player Balogun. "You really have to see that as a message to a domestic audience: that he is a strong leader who can keep international organizations in line. He can bend FIFA to his will."
The political scientist calls it sportswashing : using sport for political gain. Boykoff: "Trump does that more than any other modern American president." He believes this cannot be seen in isolation from the upcoming parliamentary elections. "His base is dissatisfied with his war on Iran; there is disappointment regarding the Epstein files. He wants to show that he is still in control."
Many not welcome
A Somali referee who was denied entry, players detained at the border, fans denied visas: the list of absentees was long. "This is a World Cup in a place where the world is not welcome," says Minky Worden of Human Rights Watch (HRW). "While the Haitian team played at the World Cup, hundreds of thousands of Haitians in the US lost their temporary residency status."
"You cannot judge this World Cup without looking at who is missing," says Lily Dong Li Rosengard of LGBTI rights organization ILGA World. "The LGBTI community is conspicuously absent because many people do not feel safe coming to the US."
"A visa is a privilege, not a right," says Andrew Giuliani, Trump's 'World Cup chief'. At a press conference, he tries to counter the criticism. "We have proven that you don't have to choose between welcoming millions of international visitors and keeping citizens and visitors safe," says Giuliani. "Americans fell in love with the World Cup and the world fell in love with America again."
There were fears beforehand of ICE operations during the World Cup. As far as is known, arrests did not occur around the stadiums. But according to Daniel Noroña of Amnesty International, the World Cup thus became a distraction from what was happening off the pitch. "Because deportations, arrests, and the unjust and cruel immigration policy simply continued."
Protest against ICE
A few kilometers from the stadium where the final is being played, protests have been ongoing for months at a detention center run by the immigration service ICE. There are concerns about food shortages and access to medication. Detainees also have hardly any access to a fair trial, says Noroña.
According to HRW, 55 people have died in ICE detention centers so far during Trump's second term. There have also been fatalities on the streets. "Just last week, two fathers were shot by ICE while on their way to work," says Worden.
Just enjoy
Fans of Argentina and Spain have their own opinions about it. "That red card… if our president called, Infantino wouldn't answer," says an Argentine fan.
"He's an asshole, or am I not allowed to say that?" says a Spanish supporter. "I don't think it should be a factor," says another Spain fan about everything that happened off the pitch this World Cup. "We should just enjoy our final, and go for our second star."
Anyway shoutout to John Williams, amazing composer and probably the one who made the other 50% of "holy shit amazing" soundtracks (Jurassic Park, Star Wars, Superman, and incidentally the original Harry Potter theme and score) who famously worked closely with the first openly transgender woman to be nominated for an Academy Award, Angela Morley. He respected her, and so far as I can see, has never made transphobic remarks.
but can we TALK about the racialized subtext of "his wife has filled his house with chintz" linking together femininity, indian export goods, commercialism, and superficiality vs "to keep it real I fuck him on the floor" linking together masculinity, AAVE, authenticity, sexuality, and vulgarity? if our aim as critics of poetry is to reevaluate this text and arrive at a feminist interpretation then we must also consider the poem's vexed relationship to race so as to not be anti-black in our criticism of the piece's presentation of masculinized sexuality nor uncritically reproduce and elevate its image of orientalized femininity.
also, from looking at the original post (non-explicit gay sex photo but still a gay sex photo so you've been warned): there isn't even any chintz in the photo. the design elements in the room all look broadly western european with the exception of a tall ceramic vessel that may be decorated with a reproduction of a chinese ink painting. chintz is an indian textile pattern, you'll see it on dresses, bedspreads, wallpaper, tapestries, upholstery, etc., but nothing like that is in the image. to imply that the house's interior design is frivolous, artificial, and unusable, the poem utilizes "chintz" despite the obvious lack of chintz because "chintz," as a popular asian export good that went on to be imitated by european manufacturers, is considered kitsch, cheap, and womanly. and, though the angle partially obscures them, the two men in the photo both appear to be white, so the poem uses the AAVE phrase "keep it real" despite the lack of black people to invoke the perception of AAVE as raw, crass, and primal. in both cases, the racialized language is being ascribed to european/white subjects to impart the white subjects with different moral values.
[Image ID: The Destiel confession meme edited so that Dean answers 'JK Rowling posted upskirt photos of a woman on Twitter' to Cas 'I love you'. /End ID]
No one doing this should be allowed to call themselves a feminist.
The wealthy author escalated a social media spat that resulted in posting a photo from a 2023 event at the Institute of Economic Affairs in
Let's not beat around the bush: Children's author JK Rowling sexually harassed someone. In some jurisdictions, this would count as sexual abuse. JK Rowling has committed a sex crime against a woman and fell back on the old rape apologist standby of "she was asking for it".
fantastic. i love it. i posted this after my wife said it yesterday and as i was doing it i was like "this can't be an original thought. as soon as i hit post someone's going to say 'you stole this from a tweet from 2014' and i'll say 'no, i stole it from my beautiful wife.'"
[Image ID: The Destiel confession meme edited so that Dean answers 'JK Rowling posted upskirt photos of a woman on Twitter' to Cas 'I love you'. /End ID]
No one doing this should be allowed to call themselves a feminist.
The wealthy author escalated a social media spat that resulted in posting a photo from a 2023 event at the Institute of Economic Affairs in
Let's not beat around the bush: Children's author JK Rowling sexually harassed someone. In some jurisdictions, this would count as sexual abuse. JK Rowling has committed a sex crime against a woman and fell back on the old rape apologist standby of "she was asking for it".
i hate it when i can tell my perception of a character is diminishing in real time because of fandom wank. like nooooo i want to maintain an objective relationship with the text but everyone is so annoying about you nooooo
“For example, if you’re trying to convince people to boycott a segregated store, your object is to convince them that boycotting the store will have a strategic effect, not that desegregation is morally important. For whatever reason, on a cognitive level human beings have a really hard time with this. Smucker cites an example of a Lefty roleplaying session where people were tasked with selling an action to people who agreed with them on principle but didn’t see the strategic merit of the action. Surprisingly, the sellers couldn’t make the conceptual switch to sell strategic merit: instead, they doubled down on THIS ISSUE IS IMPORTANT — even though it had been stressed to them that the people they were selling to bought into the importance of the issue. People react poorly to “this is important, so do WHATEVER I SAY”; they want to be convinced that what you’re proposing will work.”
You've come this far, warriors. You've finally proven that you're a worthy opponent, but this is where your adventure ends! You must face us, or die trying.
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