Who Is Brittney Griner?
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Omg, it's Casa Amor time on Love Island right now and 👀👀👀👀 no spoilers obv but we did just drop our new weekly Love Island debrief so you should defs go and listen to that if you want all the thoughts.
Also, a random thought I had before falling asleep last night:
It stemmed from me watching a TikTok video titled 'POV you just got flushed down the toilet.' From there I just started thinking about how I know VERY LITTLE about how all the underground sewers etc were built and how I've always taken them for granted. Maybe this is all really stupid for me to say but I'm here to be real with you all and this is the type of shit I think about on the daily.
PS I feel like you'll all appreciate knowing that last night when I was trying to catch the train with Rubes and her boyfriend, they both got on and then THE DOORS STARTED CLOSING ON ME BEFORE I COULD GET ON. I made it in the end but that was another life-flashing-before-eyes moment and it was hilar.
Who is Brittney Griner?
6 Killed in Shooting at July 4 Parade in Chicago Suburb
New episode of our Love Island debrief!!
NFTs and the monetization of hope
Turns out we all relate to post-concert depression
Do you use the left or right ‘shift’ button?
Who is Brittney Griner?
“Brittney Griner, the two-time Olympic gold medalist who plays for the Phoenix Mercury in the WNBA and for Russia’s UMMC Ekaterinburg during the off-season, was arrested [in Russia] on drug charges in February after Customs found vape cartridges in her luggage at the airport.”
Yep - back in February (one week before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine), Brittney Griner - a pretty famous basketball player - was detained in Russia for having vape cartridges that contained traces (0.7 grams) of cannabis oil in her luggage. She’s been stuck over there for months, and her trial - which many people think is going to end in conviction - has just begun.
Britney is now basically one of Russia’s ‘wartime hostages’ and is essentially being used as a pawn to try and deter the US from supporting Ukraine. Even though the Kremlin have denied that the charges against Griner were politically motivated, “reports in Russian state media indicate that Moscow sees Ms. Griner as a valuable asset in its confrontation with the United States.”
“She has been touted in Russian state media as an asset who could be traded for a Russian arms dealer sitting in an American prison.
Though Russia’s drug laws can carry harsh penalties, a foreigner caught with a small amount would usually face no more than a month in jail, a fine and deportation, but Mr. Putin’s government has a long history of using detention for international leverage, sometimes to obtain the release of a Russian held abroad.”
It's being said that Brittney could get up to 10 years at a penal colony (a distant or overseas settlement established for punishing criminals by forced labour and isolation from society), and as I said earlier, legal experts say she’s likely to be convicted. I'll keep you updated on how the trial comes along.
6 Killed in Shooting at July 4 Parade in Chicago Suburb
Content warning: gun violence.
Another day, another shooting. Today's one took place in Chicago, where a gunman opened fire from a rooftop into a July 4th parade in suburban Highland Park. Six people have been killed and dozens more are in the hospital with injuries.
The gunman has not yet been identified, so a massive search is taking place in the area as you're reading this.
Happy Independence Day I guess.
A Love Island Debrief: Welcome to Casa Amor
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Luce and Liv debrief episodes 20-27 of Love Island!
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NFTs and the monetization of hope
I feel like this piece in Vox, which looks at NYC NFT (just a huuuuuge NFT event) outlines the way I feel towards all this Web3 stuff - I’m optimistic about technology/ love seeing people build/test/make new things, but I’m not fully sold on the hype over NFT’s in particular (which is fine! Some people choose to put value in these things! And that’s up to them!) Here’s an excerpt I agree with:
“Much of what’s going on in crypto, perhaps especially in Web3 (the supposed next version of the internet) and NFTs (unique digital bits), is pretty scammy and predatory. A lot of it’s based on some future promise of “utility” that in most current iterations translates to nothing more than hype. That hype is generated by a select few on the backs of the masses, some desperate to be part of contrived communities. It fails at its basic premise of decentralization and taking the power out of the hands of concentrated authorities.
Still, if you immerse yourself in the arena for a bit, you can start to see why some of this works. Everything has felt so bad for so long, everyone seems so disconnected. People want to feel excited, and if a rainbow drawing that says it’s doing an album with Pharrell does it for you, why not? We feel an inherent desire to be a part of something, to belong, and we often spend money to achieve that.”
The piece rounds itself out by saying something along the lines of… the internet is a bummer, the art/creativity world is broken, and privacy in the age of tech companies is basically a lie, so at least with web3 we’re trying something new, because as long as we’re doing that there’s at least a little bit of hope 💘
Turns out we all relate to post-concert depression
Yesterday I posted Jen’s email asking if we related to her feelings of post-concert depression after seeing Harry. I knew that the answer was going to be overwhelmingly: “YES, WE ALL DO,” but Jen, if you’re reading this, here are a few other interesting phenomena (phenomenons???).
We have Mandy, who wants us to know about ‘Glitter Crash:’
“The term concert depression made me remember something similar from when I used to perform burlesque in Auckland. It's called Glitter Crash, and refers to the big low that burlesque performers experience after the extreme high of a show or festival. I just thought you might find that interesting, as I think it applies not just to burlesque performers, but most people who perform, perhaps even Harry Styles 😁”
Luce (not me) who calls it a ‘concert hangover’:
“Just want to chime in on the whole post-concert depression, I work as a concert photographer, so I am going to a number of concerts every month. Some are bands I am super passionate about, others I’ve only just heard of. Regardless of who is performing I always experience what I call a “concert hangover” after every show. There is just something about being in a room full of people where everyone is singing along that creates a super weird sense of connection to the experience and people around me. Not to mention the over stimulation of sound, lights, and of course smells (ick) that always give me a bit of an adrenaline rush. So, it’s always in the aftermath that the “concert hangover” sneaks up; being alone in silence can feel so crushing after spending a couple of hours surrounded by so many people and soooo much stimulation from the environment.”
And Jenny, who reckons it’s like the opposite of hangxiety (and also sent in one of my fave memes)
“Oh my god Luce, please tell Jen that she is NOT weird. Post concert and esp. post Harry Styles withdrawal is SO real. I went to see him two weeks ago and my mood ever since has been best personified by the "Feel like pure shit just want *him* back meme" (see attached)
The way I see it, it's like the opposite of hangxiety... You just want to go back to a moment where you were surrounded by pure joy and shared ecstasy. I guess that's also why I'm still talking about Glastonbury six years after I went... Yep, I'm THAT annoying person!”
Do you use the left or right ‘shift’ button?
So many of you asked for a 'both' option, saying it depends on the letters you're using/ what you're up to. I felt like choosing chaos tho, so I forced you to make a decision out of the two:
19% use right
81% use left
The Hidden Life of a Christian-College Professor (The New Yorker)
The surprising reason frozen chicken nuggets are so hard to find (The Spinoff)
Jack Antonoff’s Gift for Pop-Music Collaboration (The New Yorker)
The Fucked Up State Of America (The Shit Show)
Our Love Island Debrief (Culture Vulture)
Celebrities react to Roe V Wade Being Overturned (Culture Vulture)
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