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neerasrealm · 4 years

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“Send wholesome family requests” I HAVE BEEN SUMMONED AND I would request just like

Holiday things?? Like Christmas or Easter or if they even do stuff like that

OOOH THIS ONE’S INTERESTING OK OK I’m gonna do as many holidays as I can think of

New year’s eve

Everyone is home. The entire family comes to visit for christmas and stays at least till new years. the kids are allowed stay up till midnight, they watch fireworks and just do the general new years eve stuff!

Yes they do the kiss thing when it hits midnight. I’m a sap leave me be

When I say the entire family I mean Slender’s brothers and Kate the chaser (she lives on a farm out of state </3)

Valentine’s day

Listen ok. So many of the people in the mansion are dating so a lot of em just go on dates or buy flowers

everyone is lovey dovey for a day leave them be

Tim sits in his room staring at Jay’s old hat waiting for february 15th to roll around

maybe one day I’ll go more in depth about what each couple does to celebrate ;)

St Patrick’s Day

I’m Irish let me have this one

LJ celebrates by getting hammered and singing irish drinking songs with the older creeps

Slender takes the younger ones to a local parade so they don’t have to see Jack being a bad role model

If you’re not wearing green Jeff and Cody will hunt you down and punch you on the arm

Easter

Slender sets up an easter egg hunt in the woods! he makes it extra hard since there’s so many people taking part, and a majority of them have supernatural powers

Tim, hanging upside down from a tree: can i offer you an egg in these trying times

yes the older creeps take part. let them have fun

and they want chocolate

Pride month

MOST OF THE PEOPLE IN THE MANSION ARE GAY AND/OR TRANS

Slender lets people put pride flags up if they want

local pride events get RAIDED by the slender family you can’t STOP THEM

Jack dresses like a rainbow nightmare for a month

Everyone else wears a couple rainbow items throughout the month because of him

‘’yearly reminder that i am gay’‘

‘‘yeah we know’‘

Halloween

This one might be long my family is kinda obsessed with halloween so y’know. lotsa projection

the moment it hits october you know Jeff, Ben, EJ, Cody and Sally are going shopping for decorations

The mansion is decorated from top to bottom. skeletons, statues, animatronics, you name it.

they go all in

the outside of the mansion has a fake graveyard set up

LJ doesn’t like creepy clown decorations :( they don’t use any

COSTUMES

they go all in on costumes

slender helps to make them

you’d think the creeps would take the opportunity to walk around without a disguise for once

nah dressing up is FUN BRO!

LJ takes Sally trick or treating along with a bunch of other kids that he’s friends with

just a gaggle of kids running around with this giant clown man

Sally’s go-to costume is a pirate

she loves pirates

Ben, the rest of his gaming friends and Jeff go trick or treating together

they’re just running around like feral bastards. Liu goes with them later on when he joins the family <3

FREE CANDY WHOOO

they attend bonfires and just cause chaos

EJ, Tim and Cody attend whatever local halloween party they can find because they wanna have fun

Helen and Dina go out together to local festivals leading up to halloween

Helen is really good at designing original costumes

they just like being among people and seeing other’s costumes

Liu and Momo watch spooky movies leading up to halloween

Liu is one of the few people in the mansion who actually gets scared by horror movies

everyone else is just desensitized GSDHDGVSHJDSGH

‘’Liu calm down ghosts don’t even work like that smh’’

everyone collectively has a candy induced hangover in early november. smh.

Thanksgiving

I’m Irish so idk what thanksgiving really is???

Slender cooks for days on end getting ready

Kate comes home for it! she brings her own food and stuff she grew on her farm

Slender loves seeing her 🥺 that’s his LITTLE GIRL he LOVES HER

Trender also comes to visit! he lives all the way up in new york, so they don’t see him super duper often, but he always stays for holidays!

brings stuff from fancy bakeries and new clothes for everyone

he always brings tons of gifts. its his way of making up for never being around

big family dinner <3 they love each other

Christmas

Literally a month later everyone comes back AGAIN

again, Slender spends a few days in advance cooking. nowhere near as intense as thanksgiving tho

the mansion is decorated top to bottom. they have a GIGANTIC christmas tree just COVERED in decorations

slender loves the winter time <3 it reminds him of when he lived in poland

holiday markets!! you know they’re all going to those!

WINTER FESTIVALS YES

lots of family outings throughout december

sally loves going ice skating and they usually all go except for Ben

Tim takes him and Jeff out to do something else while everyone else skates. he isn’t good at skating, and neither is Jeff.

mall santa slenderman

so many fucking gifts. there’s so many of them and they all get gifts for each other so everyone gets like 20 gifts every year

holiday shopping is TOUGH

SNOWBALL FIGHTS

slender makes the best hot chocolate around christmas time

he knits sweaters for everyone too

LJ gets SUPER EXCITED throughout december

christmas is his favorite holiday because it’s also his birthday!!

slender makes a fuss of him leading up to christmas because. husbands.

LJ in a christmas sweater send tweet

trender brings so many gifts. all of them are expensive as all hell. it’s great

christmas eve is spent singing carols together in the living room and just enjoying being together as one giant family 🥺 im a sap istg

aaand that’s every holiday! this post took nearly an hour to type HDSVGHGDSH I GOT SO CARRIED AWAY SORRY FSHGFADSJHFSJ

#ask #zyxqui #creepypasta #creepypasta hc #creepypasta hcs #slender mansion #slenderman #i just love thinkin abt the family bein a family...#funny monster dad go BRRRRRR

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gothamdetected-a · 4 years

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multiverse.

i know what you’re thinking. sim are you absolutely fucking insane, don’t even TRY to tackle this one. you’re right i am insane. and yes i am still going to try and tackle a meta about DC multiverses HOWEVER, to give myself on shred of sanity on this treacherous journey, i will say that this is mainly going to be about the multiverse from a bruce perspective. this ride is a batman focused train i’m afraid. also i want to state that this is by no means a perfect explanation – i’m a) trying to keep it simple and b) still am lost on parts of the timeline myself so. its what i can offer.

ok so, originally NCP, or the national comics publication (who will one day become DC), wrote their golden age heroes on an earth now designated as earth-2. in the 30s, just before the war, comic books absolutely exploded as a media format, and a bunch of companies all jumped the gun on creating superheroes. many of DCs most endearing and recognisable heroes were created all the way back then, however many of them also are not quite who you will recognise as the character today. hal jordan wasn’t green lantern, but was instead a man called alan scott, jay garrick was the flash instead of barry allen etc etc. don’t worry though! batman is still batman, and has been bruce wayne since 1939. earth-2 batman, as he will come to be known, is a bright kind of guy found on technicolour pages with a cute lil robin by his side – there is a reason for this. the war. literally NCP said we cant be sending out dark and gritty comics to people dying in trenches so time to make it colourful and faintly ridiculous, and bruce wayne is a surprisingly optimistic guy for a man who watched his parents be slaughtered in front of him.

of course, by the 60s, NCP (who are also sort of known as NPP and really known by your average joe as superman-dc, based on their most successful comic runs) had realised their timelines were getting a bit squiggly for their golden age heroes, and most of them had been replaced out by their silver age counterparts anyway. so between 1961 and 1963, NCP start creating another “earth”, officially designated earth-1, which would become their main planet for all kinds of superhero shenanigans. the justice society of america becomes the justice league of america, and when you think of batman, you’re probably thinking of earth-1 batman. at least pre crisis. and, once they get taste for building whole new earths, we also get earth-3 (1964), or “opposite world”, where the good guys are bad guys, and batman is owlman and instead of the jla we have the crime syndicate of america.

so sim, what other earths did dc come up with? well, i literally refuse to list them all because it was a multiverse and they did not slow down, but the ones that are most important to me are earth-5 where the only hero to live on this planet is bruce wayne/batman, and earth-89 where lois marries bruce instead of clark ahAHAHHAA. but i can tell you that pre-crisis there are 91 designated earths, and basically it could have gone on forever. there was an earth-c minus, earth-124.1, an earth where everyone was reptiles, honestly it was a MESS. and therein lies the problem.

now i’ve just used the term “pre-crisis”. what’s that, sim? maybe you’re not very familiar with comics, or with the recent dctv version of said comics, and so i will endeavour to explain one of the most brain numbing storylines that spans DC. also known as a retcon. see all these earths with their own histories and heroes and well everything really was becoming very inconvenient and meant a lot of world jumping and who can interact with who and everything was getting like spaghetti because they couldn’t calm down on the earth-building. so DC (who are officially DC at this point, 1977 babeyy), specifically a guy called marv wolfman (coolest name ever) who was sick of so many earths, comes up with the bright idea that will later form into a comic run called crisis on infinite earths (1985-1986). it was a serious crossover event, really considered by many to be the first of its kind. it sold extremely well, boosting dc’s flagging sales against it’s biggest rival, marvel. and as for the plot, it’s a bit convoluted but essentially some bloke turns up and starts to destroy all these worlds, and it becomes a race between the heroes and villains as to who can save/conquer the remaining earths that are left. although there are crises before and after this specific run, pre-crisis basically always refers to this particular crisis event, as it really shaped DC for the next 30 years.

for a while the retcon does an okay job of keeping the number of earths low. there’s still some earths that are considered non-continuous floating around, but mainly there’s just earth-1, which is now a merger of the most important “earths” that existed pre-crisis, and a way for all of DCs heroes to now be in one place and interact with each other. other earths at this point include;

earth-23 (1986) – a small pocket dimension

earth-17 (1990) – we don’t talk about this. honestly spare yourself and. don’t look. its horrific.

earth-27 (1990) – a historically divergent planet with a hero actually called vegetable man.

earth-85 (1987) – a hodgepodge of post-crisis characters live here, chillin

earth-988 (1990) – superboy is the only hero in this universe

the antimatter universe – all of pre-crisis’ earth-3 villains, including owlman, get shoved here for later use when dc need a couple of villains to come back.

and for a while all is well. then comes DC elseworlds (1989). which. you know. i love. it gave me victorian batman. pirate batman. caveman batman. vampire batman. frankenstein batman. terrorist batman fighting against russian!superman. they even gave me marvel crossovers, with captain america meeting batman. it was a glorious time. technically elseworlds is not considered canon, ran outside of canon as a way for writers to explore those wacky kind of worlds lost to the crisis, which is dumb because some of the plot lines are both hilarious and incredible. but the numbers started to get ridiculous again. most elseworlds are named after the year that the plot takes place in, so we get earth-1889, earth-1938 etc, but even more of them just seem to have random designations. i think by the time they reached earth-5050 they sort of knew that theyd fucked up again. we’ve had zero hour, we’ve got hypertime and kingdom come, and besides, its been a while since they had a good crossover, so by the time 2005 rolls around its time for crisis pt 2 (because dc love to use the word crisis for crossovers) or as it’s officially known infinite crisis. infinite crisis has an even more confusing plot involving a bunch of slightly nuts versions of characters escaping a pocket dimension, earths being created and then merged, and a rogue ai which batman made and then has to destroy because his own creation becomes too powerful etc etc. the only good thing to come out of it was earth-0, or bizarro world, because bizarro & batzarro are my babies. don’t worry though, this new set of earths won’t last long either, as in 2008 DC conclude their trilogy of crises with final crisis that featured one of the most important events in batman’s history – darkseid “killing” him. yes the quotations are important. i’ll leave you to infer what they mean.

so 3 crises later and everything is still just as messy as they’ve ever been and there’s 60 years worth of comic history being tangled about, and marvel had already established a very successful reboot in 2000, and anything marvel do, we can do better, so DC do their first, full and proper reboot. unlike retcons before it, which is where they retroactively try to fix what people already know and simplify timelines & earths, this is like someone shaking the etch-a-sketch and starting fresh. back in infinite crisis an arbitrary number was assigned to how many “earths” there could be – 52. and so in 2011, DC go hey that’s neat and create what becomes known as the new- or nu-52. heroes are given shiny new backstories, everything is streamlined and wonderful, sales rise, DC has a clean slate to build off again.

ha.

yeah that doesn’t happen.

this reboot, also known as flashpoint, due to it being spawned from another big ol’ crossover of the same name, shows barry allen trapped in an alternate universe where everything is not quite right – his mother is alive, superman is nowhere to be found and he doesn’t have his powers. worst of all thomas wayne is batman. yeah, batman’s dad is batman. thanks DC, i hate it. reverse-flash has tried to change history and stop the jla from ever being formed – le gasp. barry goes to fix it, merges three universes together – earth-0, which isn’t a bizarro world but now the “main" earth, also called new earth or prime earth (DC), earth-13 (vertigo) and earth-50 (wildstorm), but also causes 10 years to be “lost” to these characters. there are now 52 brand spanking new earths, each sitting in their own universe as part of the multiverse. no one remembers anything except barry. even for a reboot and convergence of DC’s franchises, it’s messy as fuck. and it goes to shit very very quickly. people don’t really like n-52. DC have cancelled everything, certain characters such as cassandra cain-wayne are fucking ERASED from existence, no one likes the new costume designs, its an absolute shit show and the plots get very confusing very quickly.

so what do DC do?

they reboot again. sigh.

only 5 years after the mess of nu-52, they produce DC rebirth, a new relaunch of all their famous runs. brainiac does some magic and collects a bunch of worlds together and magically we’re all going to forget the last 5 years of comic hell. it is a reboot to retcon flashpoint as though that never happened. yes, DC are actually retconning their own reboots. talk about sweeping it under the carpet. technically “rebirth” only ran for a year as a promotional thing for the reboot, before joining with the larger, now-singular DC universe, however everyone still calls it rebirth because if we don’t give these things names it will get even more fucking confusing than it already is. rebirth also still has 52 universes making up the DC multiverse, just to make things even more simple and easy to understand (DC what is it with 52. why 52.) although lots of the earths in this multiverse have been re-designated – eg. pre-crisis earth-31 was home to an aged batman who fakes his death to go train a bunch of new vigilantes (the dark knight returns), and now 31 is an apocalyptic wasteland or some shite. a lot of these earths were re-designated during the flashpoint/nu-52 era, and even though rebirth was supposed to erase that, DC have decided never mind we’ll keep it. there’s also 7 mysteriously undesignated earths – ooh spooky, they definitely won’t feature in the next major crossover. also for a multiverse with 52 universes, they sure do have more than 52 : there’s the microverse, a bunch of universes collectively called “the sphere of the gods” where apokalips and like, literal heaven & hell exist, an innerverse???, dreamworld, limbo, DC are taking the piss they only said there were 52 earths but that means they can make as many other shitty dimensions and pocket-universes as they please apparently. don’t even get me started on the source wall. for the most part the writers just. don’t acknowledge this and stick to the main prime earth. for the most part. thanks for throwing thomas wayne as batman back into the mix, rebirth.

so that’s the last of it, right sim? eh, almost. it should have been the last of it, really. and then geoff johns couldn't keep his mouth shut and produced possibly the worst comic in recent history, if not ever, doomsday clock. now doomsday clock is a nightmare for an impossibly long list of reasons that i won’t get into here because this isn’t a rant about why i think doomsday clock is the worst thing to ever happen to dc (although that’s a catchy title i should use that some day) - no, the reason i bring up doomsday clock is because. oh my god even saying this makes me sad. doomsday clock proves that the pre-crisis universes still exist and are still out there. somewhere. canonically. sim why is that sad i thought you liked everything pre-52. it’s sad because it means at any point now, DC could bring them back, ruin their own legacy, make everything even more confusing than it already is. i love pre-52 stuff but you gotta leave it alone. currently doomsday clock has only established that these universes exist as a way to honour every era of superman, because DC didn’t want to completly erase some of the incredible work and storylines put into him as a character. fine, fair enough. but it does leave the possibility that they will try and return to them too. comic book writers love doing funky story lines like that. they think they need to write something that’s never been done before and instead of coming up with something actually unique, they just poke around in the multiverse WHICH IS HOW WE ENDED UP WITH THIS AS A PROBLEM IN THE FIRST PLACE.

ahem.

hopefully this helped clarify some stuff for people, especially those folks who aren’t big comic fans/expereience dc through the DCEU or DCTV, when encountering rpers who say they base their characterisation off of, for example pre-n52/flashpoint comics, like myself.

oh, and thank you for coming to my ted sim talk.

#i dont know if i can put this as a meta #its just me ranting again #hm #\system\directory\hidden.txt ›› META #long post /

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xeford2020 · 4 years

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1953 Ford Sunliner Pace Car

The 1953 Ford Sunliner, Official Pace Car of the 1953 Indianapolis 500. (THF87498) As America’s longest-running automobile race, it’s not surprising that the Indianapolis 500 is steeped in special traditions. Whether it’s the wistful singing of “Back Home Again in Indiana” before the green flag, or the celebratory Victory Lane milk toast – which is anything but milquetoast – Indy is full of distinctive rituals that make the race unique. One of those long-standing traditions is the pace car, a fixture since the very first Indy 500 in 1911.

This is no mere ceremonial role. The pace car is a working vehicle that leads the grid into the start of the race, and then comes back out during caution laps to keep the field moving in an orderly fashion. Traditionally, the pace car’s make has varied from year to year, though it is invariably an American brand. Indiana manufacturers like Stutz, Marmon, and Studebaker showed up frequently, but badges from the Detroit Three – Chrysler, Ford, and General Motors – have dominated. In more recent years, Chevrolet has been the provider of choice, with every pace car since 2002 being either a Corvette or a Camaro. Since 1936, the race’s winning driver has received a copy of pace car as a part of the prize package. Amelia Earhart rides in the pace car, a 1935 Ford V-8, at the 1935 Indianapolis 500. (THF256052) Likewise, honorary pace car drivers have changed over time. The first decades often featured industry leaders like Carl Fisher (founder of Indianapolis Motor Speedway), Harry Stutz, and Edsel Ford. Starting in the 1970s, celebrities like James Garner, Jay Leno, and Morgan Freeman appeared. Racing drivers have always been in the mix, with everyone from Barney Oldfield to Jackie Stewart to Jeff Gordon having served in the role. (The “fastest” pace car driver was probably Charles Yeager, who drove in 1986 – 39 years after he broke the sound barrier in the rocket-powered airplane Glamorous Glennis.)

Ford was given pace car honors for 1953. It was a big year for the company – half a century had passed since Henry Ford and his primary shareholders signed the articles of association establishing Ford Motor Company in 1903. The firm celebrated its golden anniversary in several ways. It commissioned Norman Rockwell to create artwork for a special calendar. It built a high-tech concept car said to contain more than 50 automotive innovations. And it gave every vehicle it built that year a commemorative steering wheel badge that read “50th Anniversary 1903-1953.” Henry Ford’s 1902 “999” race car poses with the 1953 Ford Sunliner pace car on Ford’s Dearborn test track. (Note the familiar clocktower at upper right!) (THF130893)

For its star turn at Indianapolis, Ford provided a Sunliner model to fulfill the pace car’s duties. The two-door Sunliner convertible was a part of Ford’s Crestline series – its top trim level for the 1953 model year. Crestline cars featured chrome window moldings, sun visors, and armrests. Unlike the entry-level Mainline or mid-priced Customline series, which were available with either Ford’s inline 6 or V-8 engines, Crestline cars came only with the 239 cubic inch, 110 horsepower V-8. Additionally, Crestline was the only one of the three series to include a convertible body style. William Clay Ford at the tiller of “999” at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. (THF130906)

Ford actually sent two cars to Indianapolis for the big race. In addition to the pace car, Henry Ford’s 1902 race car “999” was pulled from exhibit at Henry Ford Museum to participate in the festivities. True, “999” never competed at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. But its best-known driver, Barney Oldfield, drove twice in the Indy 500, finishing in fifth place both in 1914 and 1916. Fittingly, Indy officials gave William Clay Ford the honor of driving the pace car. Mr. Ford, the youngest of Henry Ford’s grandchildren, didn’t stop there. He also personally piloted “999” in demonstrations prior to the race.

As for the race itself? The 1953 Indianapolis 500 was a hot one – literally. Temperatures were well over 90° F on race day, and hotter still on the mostly asphalt track. Many drivers actually called in relief drivers for a portion of the race. After 3 hours and 53 minutes of sweltering competition, the victory went to Bill Vukovich – who drove all 200 laps himself – with an average race speed of 127.740 mph. It was the first of two consecutive Indy 500 wins for Vukovich. Sadly, Vukovich was killed in a crash during the 1955 race. Another view of the 1953 Ford Sunliner pace car. (THF87499)

Following the 1953 race and its associated ceremonies, Ford Motor Company gifted the original race-used pace car to The Henry Ford, where it remains today. Ford Motor also produced some 2,000 replicas for sale to the public. Each replica included the same features (Ford-O-Matic transmission, power steering, Continental spare tire kit), paint (Sungate Ivory), and lettering as the original. Reportedly, it was the first time a manufacturer offered pace car copies for purchase by the general public – something that is now a well-established tradition in its own right.

Sure, the Sunliner pace car is easy to overlook next to legendary race cars like “Old 16,” the Lotus-Ford, or – indeed – the “999,” but it’s a special link to America’s most important auto race, and it’s a noteworthy part of the auto racing collection at The Henry Ford.

Matt Anderson is Curator of Transportation at The Henry Ford.

#1 Ford Daily | Đại lý – Showroom ủy quyền Ford Việt Nam 2019 Ford Daily là showroom, đại lý Ford lớn nhất Việt Nam: Chuyên phân phối xe ô tô FORD như: EcoSport ✅ Everest ✅ Explorer ✅ Focus ✅ Ranger… [email protected] 6A Đường Trần Hưng Đạo, Phường Phạm Ngũ Lão, Quận 1, Hồ Chí Minh 711240 0901333373 https://forddaily.com/ https://forddaily.com/xe/ https://forddaily.com/dai-ly/ https://forddaily.com/bang-gia/ https://forddaily.com/tra-gop/ #forddaily #dailyfordhcm #fordshowroomhcm https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ford+Daily/@10.7693359,106.696211,15z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x1f188a05d927f4ff!8m2!3d10.7693359!4d106.696211

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the-jaydog8-blog · 6 years

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E-Portfolio

Casting Jon Benet (2017) & Paris is Burning (1990)

1. Personal Impact-

Casting Jon Benet

This film resonated with me for two reasons. The first is that I feel this film acts as a sort of mirror for the viewer, forcing us to acknowledge a tendency we have as humans, where we are often consumed by curiosity to the point that we look at tragic events (i.e. the murder of Jon Benet Ramsey) as a means of our own entertainment, dehumanizing those involved and affected by the event (I’ll get into this more in the Social & Political Context section). The second reason this film affected me so deeply is too personal to share in detail, but essentially the montage scene at the end of the film really hits home, as it reminds me of a similar experience I’ve had with my own family.

Paris is Burning

I was raised Christian. The church I grew up in is a Baptist Church in Los Gatos. The congregation is primarily white, wealthy, and very conservative. My oldest friend from church was named Jason (he also went by “Jay,” like me). Besides our names, and the fact that we both came from wealthy, conservative, white families, we didn’t have much in common, but we remained good friends throughout the years. We attended church together from preschool, through the end high school. As we got older, we didn’t hangout much, but whenever shit-hit-the-fan, we were always there for each other. During our senior year, Jay came out as gay. I was surprised when he told me, but I didn’t think much of it. I just said, “Awesome!!” and gave him a hug. I was really happy for him. We then both went on to attend SCU. Over the next 4 years, I got to see Jay transform. Slowly but surely, Jay became comfortable being himself. I realized that for the first 18 years of our lives, I didn’t really know Jay. But here at SCU, I got to know him. It seemed like he had finally found a community where he felt accepted; a community where he felt no pressure to be anything other than himself, and where he felt no guilt or judgement about who he was. He graduated in Spring of 2017. He killed himself 4 months later.

When I watch Paris is Burning, I think of Jay. I think of him strutting across campus, radiating confidence, with a hot pink boa around his neck and rainbow flags attached to his backpack. I think of how he thrived in a community where he felt a sense of belonging. But then I think of the battle he fought every day. I think of the torment he felt. And then my heart breaks because I think about how he must have felt lost after leaving SCU, the safe, welcoming community he had once belonged to. I think of how he ultimately lost hope, how he saw no end to the suffering, and how he was forced to take what he saw as the only way out. So, why is Paris is Burning so important? The answer is simple: this film offers hope to the hopeless. It has been 28 years since this film was released, but it is no less valuable today than it was then. There are still so many people today struggling to find a sense of belonging, struggling to find any reason to live; this film is for them. Paris is Burning offers hope to those who desperately need it.

2. Social & Political Context

Casting Jon Benet

Ok I know literally everyone and their mom has used this video in their presentations but hear me out... I believe Childish Gambino’s “This is America” music video shares similarities with Casting Jon Benet in terms of their social/political commentary, as well as their method for delivering said commentary.

youtube

There’s this movement on social media that I’ve seen becoming more and more popular among my generation over the last couple years, which I’ve dubbed the “Good Vibes Only’ movement. Essentially, its a collective emphasis on positivity and self-care with a main guiding principle that says, “focus solely on what makes you happy, and cut out everything else.” While I’m a big believer in self-care and positivity, I feel like this practice of ignoring anything that makes you uncomfortable or upset is unrealistic and unhealthy, and has led to an increase in apathy and desensitization that is hurting our society. “This is America” and Casting Jon Benet both highlight the existence of this problem by acting as a sort of “mirror” for the viewer, where the intended audience sees their own tendencies reflected back to them by the people and events on-screen.

Childish Gambino’s video highlights the way the privileged white majority in America likes to focus on and get enjoyment from the "fun” aspects of African-American culture (rap, hip-hop, dance, etc.), but does not like to acknowledge the problems and struggles African-Americans face daily (police brutality, poverty, discrimination, etc.). #positivevibesonly...

Casting Jon Benet is an example of how easily we, in America, can get so caught up in our own curiosity that we lose track of what is really at the core of what has us intrigued. In this case, a 6 year-old girl was brutally assaulted and murdered, yet in this documentary we see how, since the murder, most of us have been so obsessed with the mystery of it all that we forget about the heartbreaking tragedy at the center of it. Again, an example of how we push away the things that make us feel sad or uncomfortable so we can focus solely on the “fun” part of it and feel good.

Paris is Burning

When this film was being made, it was an especially brutal time to be a homosexual man in New York City. The AIDS epidemic was in full-swing, and everyone was terrified of contracting the disease. On top of the fact that AIDS was claiming the lives of many gay men, it also served to completely alienate the gay community, causing them to become outcasts of society. Essentially, in the 80s, gay men in New York City were treated like lepers; they were the “untouchables” of society. Many were even cast out by their own families, leaving them to fend for themselves. While Livingston did not intend for this film to spark a social-movement - (“Paris is Burning is not a social-movement film, nor does it presume to represent the totality of queer-of-color existence. In fact, the film is quite explicit that it is specific to a time and a place,” (Hildebrand, 138)) - I do believe it serves a greater purpose.

At a time when gay men were facing relentless persecution and being pushed to the margins of society, Paris is Burning depicts how black/hispanic gay men in New York City were able to create their own community in which they found safety, solace and hope. By choosing to portray the “ball scene” in NYC, Jennie Livingston created a film which offered hope to the gay community, who, at the time, did not have many media representations that they could connect with. “The film matters to many...particularly those who have been starved for images of lives with which can they identify and that validate their right to exist and inspire alternative ways of being in the world. Thus, the film’s importance is not just historical but also affective. The cultural work this documentary has done in the world transcends the film and its filmmaker by offering models of queer world-making,” (Hildebrand, 146). Today, this film is still just as important, as it continues to serve as a message of hope to those struggling to validate their own existence, showing them that, while it feels like they have nowhere to turn, it is possible to create a new life that is worth living.

3. Director’s Voice

Casting Jon Benet

Although still very much in the early stages of her film career, Kitty Green has already begun to establish a unique voice. Green has a very unique style of reenactment that is on display in Casting Jon Benet, as well as her first film, The Face of Ukraine: Casting Oksana Baiul (2015); she holds “auditions” for the roles in her reenactments, and then uses the performances from those auditions as the actual reenactments in her film. By doing this, Green is able to show different interpretations of the same event. Green then intercuts these reenactments with interviews from the auditions, and uses that combination as the narrative structure for the film.

Paris is Burning

“...this film operates in a liberal cinéma vérité tradition that refused voice-of-God narration in order to allow the participants and the footage to speak for themselves,” (Hildebrand, 138). Much of the criticism surrounding Paris is Burning is in regards to Jennie Livingston’s “director’s voice” (or, lack-thereof). The unique thing about Livingston’s voice in this film is that she doesn’t really have one; she completely omits any sort of didactic voice from this documentary, which causes it to have a sort of open-ended narrative, with no clear resolution or call-to-action. Some criticize Livingston for this, saying that it allowed for the privileged white audience to purely get entertainment from this film, rather than being forced to think about the social issues being raised. “...the lack of the filmmaker’s own didactic voice may, in part, suggest a kind of ambiguity and account for the divided readings of the film,” (Hildebrand, 138).

4. Evolution of Global Documentary

Casting Jon Benet

Seeing as it was just released a year ago, its hard to tell the impact Kitty Green’s documentary has had/will have on the world of documentary-filmmaking. However, based on the reactions it has received, I think it is safe to say that this film is definitely making waves in the world of documentary. Even those who have criticized it, still admit that it is an important part of documentary history; “...Casting Jon Benet, is in many ways a deeply unsatisfying, even infuriating film, but I wouldn’t want not to have seen it,” (Brody). In fact, its controversy only serves to further solidify its place in the history of documentary film. Many point to Errol Morris as the main inspiration for Kitty Green’s films. However, while inspired by Morris, Green has begun to create an original style of her own. In the next few years we will be able to get a better idea of how Green’s film has impacted the world of documentary filmmaking.

Paris is Burning

At a time when gay men faced intense discrimination and lacked any sort of role-models on-screen that they could relate to, Jennie Livingston’s Paris is Burning joined films like Tongues Untied (1989) by Marlon Riggs in jump-starting a movement that provided those in the LGBTQ+ community with films they could look to for inspiration, and representation. Although Livingston claims her film is not a social-movement film, I believe it falls in the same category as films like Tongues Untied as helping drive the movement for equality in the United States.

I believe Paris is Burning has a place in film history (and apparently so does the Library of Congress, as they selected it for preservation in 2016). As I explained in my first section, this film matters for many people, for many reasons. As long as there are people in need of hope, in need of knowing there is a possibility of a better life and a better future, this film will matter.

Works Cited

“Casting JonBenet”: A Documentary That Unintentionally Exploits Its Participants" (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site. by Richard Brody, The New Yorker, April 2017.

"Film Review: Casting Jon Benet (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site." written by Peter DeBruge, Variety, April 2017.

"Is Paris Burning?", by bell hooks in Black Looks: Race & Representation; 2014.

"Love Hangover: Debates", pp 119-146 in Paris is Burning: A Queer Film Classic, by Lucas Hildebrand, 2013

http://thesantaclara.org/remembering-the-life-of-jason-jay-bassett/#.Wxi8sNXwa8o

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bestautochicago · 6 years

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The Volvo Wagon Armada

It was the Woodstock of press drives, a car launch fit for a Swedish king or, better yet, a Volvo wagon nut just like me. To commemorate the launch of the V90, its new and large but chic and sleek carryall, we persuaded Volvo to let us drive one of the first examples on U.S. soil—actually former North American CEO Lex Kerssemakers’ personal car—from the company’s corporate U.S. headquarters (since 1964) in Rockleigh, New Jersey, to the site of Volvo’s first-ever and still very much under-construction U.S. factory in Ridgeville, South Carolina. Then back again. Close to 2,000 miles.

The V90 marks not just a new Volvo wagon but also the most upscale one. It’s also a welcome re-staking of the wagon flag on American soil for the Swedish firm, and we wanted to memorialize it properly. Ditto the new factory, even if it’s not finished being built, a facility made possible by a deep-pocketed new owner—China’s Geely—and generous subsidies from the state of South Carolina. It reflects not just the record sales success Volvo has enjoyed lately but also what a fresh credit line worth more than $11 billion and a friendly state government can do for the spring in one’s business plan.

Volvo loaned us its premium hauler ($53,295 base) and helped us find, organize, and support a group of other wagons representing all eras of the company’s extensive history in the genre, along with the cars’ owners to drive them. I brought along my own light green 1967 122S wagon, bought with 80 original miles on the clock but now with 5,000 miles. A few preflight repairs, and it was ready to go the distance.

Loyal Volvo Club of America (VCOA) members all, the owners who answered Volvo’s call to join the wagon armada were mellow, their cars gloriously representing each decade since the first Volvo wagons of the 1950s and all of the carmaker’s successive wagon eras. We had mostly everything—from a show-winning 1959 445 Duett through the 122, 245, 745, 850, 240, V50, V60, all of the V70s, and a handsome 1800ES from the company’s own collection that accompanied us as far as Delaware. I’m only sorry there isn’t room here to thank everyone by name.

What didn’t turn up was a Mitsubishi-derived V40 or any representative of the 900 series, the ultimate evolution of the 700 series wagons, renamed in honor of its independent rear suspension and, in the case of the one we’d like to have seen, the 960, a straight-six motor. A much better car than it gets credit for, cursed by a short lifespan, its absence was noticed.

The 2017 V90 is svelte and comfortable as it leads its historic counterparts on a 2,000-mile road trip.

The final omission from our cavalcade of Volvos was the 145, the progenitor (1968-’74) of all the “boxes” to come, the cars that cemented the Volvo wagon thing by looking more or less the same for a quarter of a century, from the late ’60s until 1993. But divine providence intervened to correct an unconscionable oversight as we ran across a 145, a runner in only semimoderate dishabille, when we stopped at the Sub Rosa Bakery in Richmond, Virginia.

To ensure this crowd of Volvo volunteers wouldn’t go hungry on our station wagon sojourn, we brought along a couple of knowledgeable food professionals for dining tips along the way. Adam Sachs is the editor of Saveur and drives a V70. Jay Strell, a food communications strategist and fellow Brooklyn dweller, keeps a V50. Along for the ride and some light driving duty, they’d leave their own cars at home. Ditto my old friend, painter Fred Ingrams. He left his car—a too-slow-for-America V50 1.6-liter—at home in Norfolk, England, to come on a forced march to South Carolina as a passenger in a different Volvo wagon. He just hadn’t counted on it being 50 years old. Another drop-in from NYC, Jake Gouverneur, owns a Saab 9-5 wagon, but it has a blown head gasket and isn’t going anywhere.

There would, however, be no shotgun seat for Steve Ohlinger of The Auto Shop of Salisbury, Connecticut. A veteran independent Volvo mechanic, former racer, and (something tells me) former hippie, Steve brought his brown 1984 five-speed manual 245 Turbo, a rare bird. His role, to which he readily assented, was to carry The Knowledge and useful spares for when older pieces of Swedish iron fell in the line of interstate duty—except this happened not once.

Throw in a couple of Volvo PR honchos, a videographer in a V90 Cross Country, an event planner or two, plus our Automobile photographers, and there must have been 25 or more of us driving or riding along at any given moment. Teenaged me would have appreciated this concept.

Funny enough, no one ever did get an exact count on the number of participants. I later realized I was too busy driving to notice. Berkeley County, South Carolina, is a long way from Bergen County, northern New Jersey, especially in an 87-horsepower car with a pushrod engine geared to turn something like 3,800 rpm at 65 mph. The journey seems even longer and more sapping when it is conducted during a two-day rainstorm, with ’60s wipers clapping and a ’60s defroster fan hyperventilating while trying to keep up. But like all the old wagons on this trip, the 122S completed the journey without incident and no worse for the wear.

Swedish cream puff: This 1970s P1800ES “shooting brake” still cuts a stylish profile today.

Older models from the last century are one reason Volvo still has a good reputation to fall back on. Return solely to the early part of the 21st century for your wagon memories, and you’ll find Volvos with some major technical failings to answer for, cars that tarnished the company’s long-running longevity and reliability pitch. We definitely feel better about its new cars nowadays, but there is no predicting what age will bring.

On first acquaintance, though, we are impressed with just about everything to do with the black V90 T6 AWD R-Design wagon we’re driving here, though even in a fast, all-wheel-drive car we hoped for something better than the 26 mpg over some 2,000 mostly highway miles. There were undoubtedly economy-sapping power surges for which we were responsible, as there will always be with 316 hp turbo and supercharged 2.0-liter fours. But there were many more hours of economy-minded highway driving. Results closer to the EPA’s suggested 30 mpg (highway) are not too much to ask for.

The V90 looks great, and its leather-lined interior compares favorably to several Germanic alternatives. If nothing else, it’s airy and different. The car drives and rides especially well, with a nimbleness that belies its size. A little more than 16 feet long, it feels like a big, opulent car in the best sense but drives like a smaller one. Naturally, this executive-priced load hauler also comes with all of the tech and telematics features you expect. That is, expect to love, expect to regret, and one that still has us scratching our heads: Pilot Assist II, Volvo’s second-gen semi-autonomous driving system.

With $600 million of Volvo’s own money invested so far and $200 million in state incentives, Volvo expects to have spent $1 billion on the new factory and to have created 4,000 jobs here by 2030.

The latest Pilot Assist no longer requires you to track a lead vehicle, and it operates in self-driving mode at speeds up to 80 mph, which is nice. (Its predecessor topped out at a considerably less useful 32 mph.) But as “semi-autonomous” suggests, Pilot Assist II only steers for you for 18 seconds at a time, at which point a human must provide input, or the car will come gradually to a halt, which seemed dangerous to me. Another concern? The camera-based system orients the vehicle by using painted road lines on either side of the road.

Will the new V90 still be on public roads decades from now? If its forebears are any indication, the outlook is good.

As you might expect once you know how the system works, the car made large corrections following the white lines into corners, often steering later than we would have with more roll and general back and forth than an attentive, sober skipper would have allowed. Also failing to inspire confidence was the discovery that the V90 seemed willing to veer off the highway around bends where the white paint was worn off or pieces of roadway had fallen away, taking the white line with them. Last-minute driver intervention was most emphatically required. So, as with similar systems from other makers, you can’t fully rely on Pilot Assist II because you still can’t take your eyes off the road. It might make you wonder, beyond tech boasts and consumer beta testing, what is the exact point?

A wagon usually boasts the same or better interior space than its jacked-up relations and fraternal twins, and it probably handles better with its lower of center of gravity.

Speaking of points, on the ride back to our hotel one night we got a chance to admire Ohlinger’s 245 Turbo in action. By action, I don’t mean heavy acceleration or drifting but merely having its headlamps turned on. That’s because they’re airport runway lights, an unlikely fitment the Volvo guru realized one day was a more or less straight swap, so he tried it, and guess what? They light up a road as if you plan to land a commercial jetliner on it, waking up everyone for miles and inducing post-traumatic stress syndrome in those unlucky enough to be in front of you when they suddenly catch your light show in their rearview mirror. We kind of liked it and made a mental note to look into the conversion. Although, as Ohlinger pointed out, “When they’re great, they’re great. But when they’re not, they’re really not.”

Bonding bricks: No fewer than 60 years and 229 hp separate the V90 from the author’s 122S wagon. Both have their unique charms.

Bonding Bricks: No fewer than 60 years and 229 hp separate the V90 from the author’s 122S wagon. Both have their unique charms.The following day we headed to the factory site, about an hour’s drive, to inspect it from a distance while photographing all the participants in our station wagon safari. With the plant rising in the background, and the rain miraculously halted, it’s a rare photo that speaks to Volvo’s storied history and equally strong present. Carved here out of swampy woodlands, it represents a minimum investment of $600 million of Volvo’s own money and $200 million in state incentives. Volvo expects to have spent a billion dollars here by 2030 and to have created 4,000 jobs. Perhaps not what you thought of, old timer, when you saw your first 122S wagon all those years ago.

Like the wagons, I was in good shape when we arrived in Charleston for a late lunch. In fairness, however, I must admit I turned over the 122S on several occasions to other drivers while I enjoyed long stints behind the wheel of the V90. The newest, fanciest Volvo wagon yet seemed rocket-ship fast yet delightfully restful, one of the most comfortable rides going, with better seats than most all its modern competition much less those in the 122S, its ancestor from a half century ago. Lack of wind noise lends an amazing quietness to the V90’s cabin, too. Indeed Gouverneur, playing with a decibel-meter app on his phone, explained that the all-wheel-drive model was significantly quieter at 115 mph in the rain with wipers at full chat than the 122S was cruising at 65 mph with wipers off. I can’t speak to the accuracy of this because I was driving, and we all know I would never drive anywhere near that fast.

The Duett was built as a dual-purpose work and personal car and was the only body-on-frame passenger vehicle in Volvo’s U.S. lineup.

This magazine has long maintained that the station wagon format provides the most practical automotive solution for millions more Americans than are buying them now. We understand the auto industry passes time by chasing the latest styling fads, but after being rocked by the ungainly minivan and then crushed by the SUV and the hulking crossovers that followed, the once-best-selling wagon’s pendulum, which swung highest in the 1960s and 1970s, is long overdue to swing back. To the extent that logic plays any part in the matter, which is probably a dubious idea at best, the wagon is more efficient—lighter and more aerodynamic—than its crossover alternative. A wagon usually boasts the same or better interior space than its jacked-up relations and fraternal twins, and it probably handles better with its lower of center of gravity. Almost half the vehicles sold in Europe are wagons. Is life there so much different? We don’t think so.

Gimmicks and scarcity marketing are cool, I guess, but The whole idea presumes scarcity. And our trip to Volvo’s new plant proved the V90 wagon is way too good to be scarce.

Volvo has had success with sedans and even sports cars in America, but it is best known for its wagons, which are standard fixtures of the landscape in many American neighborhoods to this day. In a world of ever-changing automotive ideals, the Volvo wagon is a basic unit of automotive currency for many, the kind that spans generations. In my life, my parents drove a Volvo wagon, I drove them, my kids drove them, and with luck their kids might. Unlike some makers, Volvo’s never left the wagon field behind, and new proof in the form of the V90 warms the heart.

Yet recognizing fashion and catering to what it thinks most people think they want, the company has hastened in the 21st century to keep its lineup of crossovers and SUVs fresh, lively, and growing. Although there’s really nothing bad to say about the XC60, XC90, and upcoming XC40 models, we still prefer these platforms set up for wagon duty, pure and unadulterated. We don’t begrudge Volvo its high riders—they help pay the rent and the high taxes of super-socialist Sweden. We wish the V90, which shares its platform with the XC90, had as an option a third row of seats as does the SUV.

This affection for the wagon form generally and Volvo’s biggest wagon ever specifically is why we can’t help but second-guess the decision to soft sell the model, which is only available via internet order and not off the showroom floor. Dealers will receive as many of the Cross Country version of the V90 as they can afford to stock but no regular wagon V90s without an internet order, which is a shame.

Seven decades of Volvo wagon evolution stages at the brand’s new South Carolina plant after 1,000 miles of driving.

Gimmicks and scarcity marketing are cool, I guess, but something is wrong. The whole idea presumes scarcity. And our trip to Volvo’s new plant (which won’t build the V90 but rather the 60 series sedan and SUV) proved the V90 wagon is way too good to be scarce. With a little work, it could be the belle of the ball in affluent communities across America, a big ol’ posh station wagon for our times, an anti-SUV. Wagons rule, and if anyone ought to know that, it’s Volvo.

Source: http://chicagoautohaus.com/the-volvo-wagon-armada/

from Chicago Today https://chicagocarspot.wordpress.com/2017/12/18/the-volvo-wagon-armada/

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jesusvasser · 6 years