Gawker
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Posts Tagged “
Causes
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trends
911 is a joke
Police State Party!
"It's a first for mass transit in the United States. NYPD officers, armed with rifles, submachine guns, body armor and bomb-sniffing dogs will begin patrolling the city's subway system thanks to a 50 percent increase in a homeland security grant." Well, good thing we're putting that to good use! Turning an already problematic police force into a paramilitary organization? What could go wrong! If there's any of that grant money left we should use it to create androids that subdue anyone attempting to dance at a non-licensed bar. With a force as restrained and well-trained and not-roided out of their power-corrupted minds as the NYPD armed to the fucking teeth, what could go wrong? Should we be grateful it's just a ceremonial show of force, like those speeding cop car motorcades that wailed through midtown after the bicycle bombing? Or should we be worried! More »
kill the poor
Hollywood's Favorite Anti-Poverty Crusade Actually Making People Poorer
"Smart" celebrities who "care" about things love microcredit, the most buzzed-about poverty-ending economic fad since eating the poor. Mohammed Yunus, the guy who invented it, won a Nobel Peace Prize! And Harvard-educated Natalie Portman works tirelessly to promote the idea that small loans to impoverished people will lead to an entrepreneurial spirit that will lift everyone out of poverty. The only problem with "microcredit" is that it's actually loan-sharking, and it's destroying the lives of the people it's meant to help. France24 actually did some journalism and talked to recipients of the micro-loans instead of just taking the word of noble economists as gospel. Watch as collectors from Grameen Bank, the gigantic bank that largely runs the microcredit scheme, advise villagers to sell their children! Now, instead of just being broke, Bangladeshi villagers are deep in debt and killing themselves to escape their creditors. Finally, they are living the American Dream. So. Watch that clip here or just click through to see Natalie Portman babble at those ladies on The View about all the good work she's doing. More »
nosplice:31
Employee Canned For Not Putting Starbucks First
A former Starbucks employee named Mary-Elise Smilek says she was fired after four years with the company, just because she couldn't attend last month's mandatory 3-hour retraining session/ PR stunt. She had a midterm to study for. Harsh! Now she's the subject of much debate among the bored employees and company drones at the Starbucks Gossip blog. Some say she's a hoax; some say she's a victim; and the most hardcore corporate robots say: she got what she deserved for not completely dedicating her life to the Starbucks cause! More »
patriotism
US Military Brings Freedom To The Blogosphere
Here in America, we take a lot of freedoms for granted. Sure, it's fun to get on the internet and talk freely, expressing our opinion about everything under the sun—whether the political issue of the day, or just popular music and culture. But we have to remember that those freedoms come with a price. Our brave troops overseas are putting their lives on the line in the War on Terror so that we can sit around chatting and making jokes. That said, the US Military understands the value of the internet—and blogs—as a communications medium. So when the US Special Operations Command comes out with a study [WIRED] that expresses interest in starting military blogs, co-opting existing bloggers, and hacking the sites of enemy bloggers whose message could be detrimental to US interests, should we really be so quick to dismiss it? More »
rallies
Party Shall Go On for Deported Whoring Expert
British dandy and self-taught expert in criminality Sebastian Horsley was stopped at JFK on his way into our country for his book party yesterday, and sent right back home to London, as we learned last night. But! The party must go on. A Harper-Collins rep informed us the party for Horsley's Dandy in the Underworld is still on for tonight, at Housing Works. Only now, as the attached invite shows, it's a "LET SEBASTIAN IN RALLY." We think we've got just about enough book-releasing dandies, thank you very much, but hell, what's one more.
the power breakfast
