Most psychiatrists seem to the think that, in the case of Truman Syndrome, the fear generated by reality television—that the people of the world has gone mad for documenting each other's mundane existences, invading privacy at any cost—is simply a new trope for people who were already paranoid and delusional to grab onto. There is an air of Fear of Persecution, a good ol' crazypants standby, in the idea that cameras are documenting your every move. It's a lie, it's sinister. Everything else is fake! No one is real but me! Lonely and desperate imaginings. It must be how Lauren Conrad's dog feels. So yes the fear was always there, it's just taken on new themes. A psychiatrist at NYU tells the paper:

Most likely these people would be delusional anyway. But the more radical view is that this pushes some people over the threshold; the environment tips them over the edge. And if culture can make people crazy, then we need to look at it.

Well, right. I mean the Truman Show delusion is pretty nuts, but not that nuts. Why must that fear be relegated solely to the realm of the psychotic? Is every be-halter topped young lady bellowing and sloshing her drink around, whoop!-ing at Off the Wagon as if she were on The Real World, some sort of mental invalid? Well, maybe, but not necessarily crazy! If all behavior is learned from somewhere, it's certainly possible that our youngs are learning from reality television. They may be operating under some soft delusion that if they're not already there doing so, a camera crew could pop out and film them at any moment.

And as for the other two, well... I just don't find it that irrational to be afraid of environmental catastrophe or the Internet. I mean, you could be some tinfoil hat-wearing nutterbutter who skulks around his apartment in a soiled bathrobe listening to Mozart at full-blast, occasionally darting his hands at the computer keyboard, conversing with another bathrobe-clad insane in Missoula. And that, yes, would be crazy. But the internet does open a strange side door into one's life that is easily crept through by some wicked people. It is perfectly rational to be aware of that slice-of-modern-life fact. And the environment? Well let's just say take your unborn great-grandchildren to New York City for a visit now. Because it's not going to be around when they're breathing and blinking and in the world if we continue on this Icarusian course.

Or, you know, maybe I'm just crazy.

[via Adfreak]

Stephen Witt, a reporter from the New York Post-owned Courier-Life chain, seized the microphone to try his hand at stand-up comedy during the delay.

“What do you know about Brooklyn 99-cent stores?” asked Witt, who last made headlines for hugging Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner at a 2006 rally. “Have you ever been so broke that you had to put something on lay-away at a 99-cent store?”

Witt’s quip was met with boos...

“It was just awkward, and I feel kind of embarrassed for him,” said one woman, who said she saw Witt consuming alcohol before his artistic contribution to the evening.

And look, there's a clip!

[Brooklyn Paper]

From Leslie White, Tacoma, Washington:

Of all the animals you could have chosen for the cover story about animal minds, you chose a dog. Why not a dolphin, ape, or raven? Dogs are so overdone—and they're also destructive and noisy.

From Ed Healy, San Francisco, California:

Last year I stayed in a place in Mongolia where two lambs were tied up near a stairway. One looked at me with an expression I can only describe as abject terror...Did these lambs know they were going to be killed? Judging by the looks they gave me, I would have to say they did.

From Joyce Weiss, Wynnewood, Pennsylvania:

I swear my golden retriever Chaucer said "hi" to me one morning. I had no witnesses but didn't need any. When a dog looks at you with love in its eyes and whispers, "Hi," it is the sweetest sound imaginable. I've never doubted that animals have more intelligence than some people. Once animals learn to use the computer, we will all be convinced.

Yes.

"You know how uncomfortable that makes somebody feel, especially somebody who's going through chemo? Stupid ass bitch."

[via ConcreteLoop]

See how it feels to write down, "I want to direct." Or write down, "I want to act." See how that feels. Make pictures of what you want to do. Make collages to stimulate the primary process thinking that is the creative mode.

Collages are fun.

Meditate for five minutes and notice how quickly the time goes. Narrow down. Narrow down and make a plan. Think about a year. Think about how so many corny things are true. Think about how you are not 22. Ready yourself for sacrifice.

I know I'm not 22. But Cary, do you know whereof you speak?

I am a child of Florida's warm, wet indolence, the intoxicating rot and the rough, beefy unculturedness. I am a child of that. I know how it is to hate Florida and feel better than Florida and want to live in places like California.

Final words of wisdom?

So be with the ones who know you well. Be with the ones who see your bullshit. Work it out where you're from. Work it out, whatever it is; work it out where you're from.

You have this thing you have to do. It has something to do with film. You don't know precisely what, yet. But figure it out and then if you have to go to L.A. to do it go to L.A. But figure it out first.

Thanks!

[Salon]

Christian Group Denounces Starbucks

Over New Logo of Naked Mermaid

(San Diego, CA) Starbucks has recently introduced a new version of their logo which features a topless mermaid with her legs spread, which has caused outrage from a nation wide Christian media watchdog organization. The Resistance, with has over 3000 members nationwide, is boycotting Starbucks across the country saying their new logo is inappropriate.

The Starbucks logo has a naked woman on it with her legs spread like a prostitute, explains Mark Dice, founder of the group. Need I say more? It's extremely poor taste, and the company might as well call themselves, Slutbucks.

The all-brown logo is a replica of the one the chain used when it opened its first store in Pike Place in Seattle in 1971. The woman is actually a siren, not a mermaid, which in Greek mythology lures people to them with their beautiful songs, and then kills them, explains Dice.

The Resistance has made international news for rebuking various Hollywood celebrities for their ridiculous behavior, including Jessica Simpson, Paris Hilton, 50 Cent, Tom Cruise and others. They also demanded that Duke University change the name of their Blue Devils sports team to something not offensive to the Christian community.

# # #

[What about asking them for some lemons while you're at it, Resistance?]

Obama trounced Clinton as expected in the southern state, 56 to 42 percent with 57 percent of precincts reporting, by appealing to elite latte-sipping, coal-miner-hating whites around universities, plus working class blacks. JUST LIKE JESSE JACKSON.

Our theory, for what it's worth, is that these tales are just remnants of an old song and dance. Cruise was basically discovered, or at least developed, by David Geffen, a known and powerful gay. Wouldn't you, a 20-something year-old, cute young actor maybe play up the gay a bit, if it could land you a star-making movie like Risky Business? Now many years and great successes later, those early desperate days keep coming back to haunt him. It'd be like if someone was constantly telling potential friends and lovers stories about when you were in high school, when you were needy and would do anything to be in a clique. Except, you know, Tom is a gigantic crazy person with an army of angry lawyers and you're, well, just you.

For what seems like a century, Virginia has been desperate to reproduce. But something terrible happened! Every gay guy whose seed she wanted to steal kept getting the AIDS! Finally she met this guy at church 17 years ago and on the very first day she met him she asked him to impregnate her. And he was like "Great!" and they became best friends.

But he was brand-new to New York! And so she'd see him cruising guys and she'd be all "DON'T DO IT! IF YOU HAVE SEX WITH THE MEN, YOU WILL NOT THEN BE ABLE TO IMPREGNATE ME." Except apparently she never said anything to him? (This is okay, because according to today's Times corrections, apparently some people think that AIDS began in 1990 and ended in 1995. Heh.)

Then she found out he was sleeping with one of an AIDS-having friend's boyfriends??? Suddenly her baby-daddy was not attractive to her. "I had a vision of his healthy face desiccating before my eyes until every last piece of flesh had sunk into bone."

So then she did what any American hero would do. She stopped speaking to him totally. And never told him why.

This is exactly the kind of powerful, assholish first-person writing we have come to expect from Modern Love.

A decade and a half later, apparently the guy has not become a desiccated corpse, and is doing fine on the other coast, except for today, because he's probably just read Modern Love and thought, "Wow, that woman was fucking crazy and this is the most passive-aggressive non-apology for being shut out of someone's life that I have ever been subjected to!"

TIMES SQ. NUDE DUDE: PART 2 [New York Post]

Epstein: 'Call Me Janice' [Radar]

Gawker Media polls require Javascript; if you're viewing this in an RSS reader, click through to view in your Javascript-enabled web browser.

Says his blog:

Called this BIG firm lawyer about a case last week. Now I have a couple of hundred cases of my own and also run a talent agency. With all that going on I have lots of time for my 2 wifey girl friends - wifey 2 who is 18 almost 19 requires lots of attention. Wifey 1 who is 23 only requires money. Don't have a nice Jewish Hell housewife to deal with so i can't really comment. I still have lots of time to feed the fish, sit on the boat watch 4 hours of horror movies on Sci Fi channel daily, look for wifey 3, and lots of other stuff.

Finally, Ms. Davis procured another headset and Pinch's presentation could begin. He spoke of the "ongoing health of this enterprise" and the "commitment to shareholders." He said that pursuit of the core journalistic mission also delivered for shareholders. He said that the company was reinventing to succeed in the new digital era and that it would have new platforms in digital space.

Then he talked about some bad news. There have been declines in print revenue, Mr. Sulzberger said. The company has a stock price "that makes none of us happy." The company, he said, is working to increase revenue and reduce expenses. Aren't we all!

Some Wall Street analysts and shareholders don't like the way that the Times stock structure is set up, with one class of stock for family members and the board of the Ochs-Sulzberger trust (most of whom are family members). To that, Mr. Sulzberger said that the dual class structure was adopted to preserve the stability of the enterprise. And in any case, he said, shareholders were well aware of the company's share structure when they bought the stock! So there!

Mr. Sulzbeger said he was "vitally concerned with building shareholder value."

He mentioned that he and his cousin, Michael Golden, who is the publisher of the International Herald Tribune, had voluntarily given up their stock-based compensation last year, and that a pool of $2 million—the amount of this compensation—had been set aside and distributed to employees.

"We are committed to increasing shareholder value," Mr. Sulzberger said.

Times Co. CEO Janet Robinson took the podium. She said that the Times is the number one newspaper read among college students, as the article about the girls who go to Newton North High School flashed up on the screen. She mentioned that the New England Media Group, which includes the Boston Globe, has run into a rough patch lately, but the company is optimistic because of the new banks, retailers, and hotels coming into the area. The hotels, it appears, will save us all. The Times has also purchased a company called Calorie-Count.com.

Did you know that the Times has a research and development team that does hush-hush projects like the (absolutely dreadful) Times Reader? And data-mining? The company has also engaged a "major consulting firm" to pursue cost reductions—that's right, the efficiency consultants are roaming the halls! Look out!—and is leasing out five floors of the new office building to the law firm Goodwin Procter, which used to be called Goodwin Procter & Hoar, until the partners realized that it sounded like the sister firm to Dewey, Cheatem & Howe.

Soon it would be time for questions from the audience! But first, more words from Arthur. He spoke of David Halberstam's death, mentioning that Mr. Halberstam had recently spoken at an event honoring Pinch's aunt. Mr. Halberstam had said that the Sulzbergers were a very special family, with a special obligation and responsibility. Then he said that the dual-class stock structure protected the journalistic integrity of the Times. His grandfather, Arthur Hays Sulzberger, had created this structure "to get us through times like these," he said. These times demand the Times stock structure.

"We will deliver," he said. It had been a long presentation, Mr. Sulzberger said, but he wanted to show the shareholders that the company was "ready to address the challenges of the web."

The two microphones were ready for questions from the audience. Evelyn Davis was first in line. She said that a jealous female secretary had manipulated the timing of this board meeting, and that she had been deprived of her rights as a shareholder. She said shareholders should be entitled to a paper stock certificate and decried that ongoing move to the web. She brought up the Morgan Stanley portfolio manager Hassan Elmasry and addressed Mr. Sulzberger directly, saying, "I feel very bad about the personal attacks he made on you. Of all the people here, you are the best of them all." The audience applauded.

Ms. Davis compared Mr. Elmasry to Robespierre. "Arthur, we have our disagreements, but I love you," Ms. Davis said. Mr. Sulzberger did not look as if he returned the favor. She asked about outside legal fees and was told that the figure last year was $11.8 million, and she said that outside lawyers were like taxi drivers. "They like to run up the meter and never take you directly to your destination!"

An angry Jewish man read a typed, single-spaced speech about the Times coverage of Israel, and another man seemed confused about the law of averages when he asked why the average age of Times readers was not lower. Another woman ranted about the Times' "knowingly false and misleading reporting," and said she had filed a "public-interest lawsuit" to that effect. When informed by the board that the lawsuit had been dismissed, she said that just yesterday she filed an appeal and had brought the appeal to the meeting for the board to read, which she then delivered to the stage.

Evelyn Davis retorted that this was not the place for lawsuits. Then she said that Times business writer Gretchen Morgenstern only cares about institutional investors. She asked if Times managing editor Jill Abramson was in attendance. When told she was not, Ms. Davis said that just like Ms. Abramson, she was a fan of Somerset Maugham, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ernest Hemingway, and she asked Mr. Sulzberger to have Ms. Abramson give her a call so that they could discuss their mutual interest.—Doree

Investors Withhold More Than 40 Percent of Votes for N.Y. Times Directors [AP]
Earlier: Arthur Sulzberger's Circle And Hassan Elmasry